A Valanginian crustacean microcoprolite ichnofauna from the shallow-marine hydrothermal vent site of Zengővárkony (Mecsek Mts., Hungary)

Abstract

A rich and diverse crustacean microcoprolite ichnofauna is reported from the Valanginian of the Mecsek Mts., Hungary. Localities from the Bolondút and Dezsö Rezsö valleys near Zengövárkony (Eastern Mecsek Mts.) provided Favreina aV. dispentochetarius, Palaxius darjaensis, P. triochetarius, P. salataensis, P. tetraochetarius, and P. decaochetarius. They occur in limonitic and partly metasomatized limestones, limestone olistoliths, and ammonite body-chambers. The remarkable richness of this ichnofauna plus the previous records from the same environment (altogether 11 ichnospecies of four ichnogenera from a single stratigraphic level) make it the most diverse crustacean ichnofauna of the Mesozoic. The former ecosystem of the ichnofauna is considered a deeper shallowmarine (water depth <300 m) hydrothermal vent on which the producers of the microcoprolites lived. The related brachiopod fauna shows a remarkable size and is dominated by Lacunosella. This fauna is not similar to typical fossil deepsea vent faunas; however, it oVers a thorough understanding of other fossil shallow-marine hydrothermal vent faunas and the role of crustaceans in these ecosystems. This is the Wrst record of crustacean coprolites from such a fossil site and documents that crustaceans were diverse and played an important role in shallow-marine, non photosynthesisbased ecosystems in the geological past.

New kingenoid (Terebratellidina) brachiopods with larger body sizes from the Early Cretaceous of Zengővárkony (Mecsek Mountains, Hungary)

“…The volcanism equivocally refers to continental crust origin (Embey-Isztin, 1981). For the moment, it seems most plausible that this former environment was similar to that of the Recent Milos Island hydrothermal activity field (Morri et al, 1999), which is in line with the rich and diverse crustacean microcoprolite ichnofauna described from this locality by Palik (1965) and Bujtor (2012b).…”

“…The section (Fig. 3) is an artificial cut prepared for fossil collecting on the western slope of the Dezső Rezső Valley reported in detail by Bujtor (2006, 2007, 2012b), Bujtor and Szinger (2018), and Bujtor et al (2013). The section traverses the volcano-sedimentary succession of the Mecsekjános Basalt Formation and the overlying Apátvarasd Limestone Formation.…”

Early Cretaceous crustacean microcoprolites from Sierra de la Cara Cura, Neuquén Basin, Argentina: Taphonomy, environmental distribution, and stratigraphic correlation

“…upper Carboniferous of the Ural Mountains (Masse and Vachard, 1996), and upper Permian of Oman , but is most widespread in the Upper Triassic in the USA (Kristan-Tollmann and Tollmann, 1983), Peru (Senowbari-Daryan and Stanley, 1986), and Italy . It was also described from Jurassic beds in Spain (Schweigert et al, 1997), Germany (Helm and Schülke, 2004) and France (Senowbari-Daryan et al, 2007), from the Lower Cretaceous of Hungary (Bujtor, 2012), and from the Cretaceous of MIT Guyot in the northwestern Pacific Ocean (Senowbari-Daryan and Grötsch, 1992). Material.…”

“…It differs from P. decaochetarius by the morphology of canals 4/4 0 and 5/5 0 which are crescent shaped in P. decaochetarius, and also in size and width of the canals. On the other hand, the diameter in P. decaochetarius ranges between 450 and 1060 mm (see Bujtor, 2012), while in P. caracuraensis the ranges is 880e1800 mm.…”

“…Similarly, Senowbari-Daryan and proposed a correlation for the Upper Cretaceous of Egypt. More recently, Bujtor (2012) and Jáger et al (2012) reported some concordance in the temporal distribution of Valanginian species of Favreina.…”