Puddlebrook Quarry

Also within

Gloucestershire County

Condition (Natural England)

Geology & landscape

Mining / Industrial: Quarry · Geological Period: Carboniferous · Rock Type: Limestone, Sandstone

Description

Description This quarry is an important geological site providing the only exposure on the northern side of the Forest of Dean showing the basal strata of the Westphalian Series of the Upper Carboniferous. Here, these consist of conglomerates, differing markedly from the mainly sandy beds of equivalent age to the south. This shows that the area to the north of the Forest of Dean was uplifted in the early Westphalian, to become the source of most of the Westphalian sediments in this area. This is thus an important site for understanding the geological development of the Forest of Dean Coalfield. The Westphalian conglomerates rest upon the Lower Carboniferous Drybrook Sandstone, which here yields a unique assemblage of late Dinantian fossil plants. The flora consists of ten species, mainly lycopods and pteridosperms, together with a bryophyte and a possible progymnosperm. Three are unique to the locality, viz. Scutellocladus variabilis Lele and Walton, Diplopteridium holdenii Lele and Walton and Muscites plumatus Thomas. The latter is particularly significant since it is the oldest known moss and thus shows that they were quite distinct from the liverworts as far back as the Dinantian. The flora has some species incommon with the contemporary Lower Brown Limestone and Lower Oil Shales floras, but in overall composition is quite distinct. The site is thus of national importance for understanding the distribution of Lower Carboniferous plants, as well as supplying unique information on the early evolution of the lycopods, pteridosperms and mosses.