The Prince Creek Formation is a geological formation in Alaska with strata dating to the Early Maastrichtian stage of the Late Cretaceous. Dinosaur remains are among the fossils that have been recovered from the formation.[2]
Age
The Prince Creek Formation aged from 80 to 61.7 million years ago. The Kikak-Tegoseak Quarry, where almost all of the dinosaur fossil are from, is located near the middle of the formation, and is about 70.6 to 69.1 million years ago.[3][4] A lower section, the Kogosukruk Tongue, ages from 72 to 71 million years ago, in the latest Campanian.[5] The youngest part of the formation is Ocean Point, which extends into the Paleogene, at the end of the Danian, based on the age of ostracods and mollusks.[6] In the middle of the formation is the Coleville River Bluff, which extends from the Late Campanian to the Middle/Late Maastrichtian, in which pollen spores are common.[7]
Habitat
During the time when the Prince Creek Formation was deposited, Earth was going through a greenhouse phase. The rocks in it are alluvial, and were, at the time of burial, on a muddy coastal plain. Leafy plants, roots and pollen are known from the formation, and they show that trampling by dinosaurs was common. It can be proven that during the Maastrichtian the Prince Creek Formation bordered a large body of water by the presence of gypsum and pyrite in nearby rock. Large amounts of plants material are represented by peridonoid dinocysts, algae, fungal hyphae, fern and mossspores, projectates, Wodehouseia edmontonicola, hinterland bisaccate pollen, and pollen from trees, shrubs, and herbs. Based on the large amounts of dinosaur and plant remains, the Prince Creek Formation was deduced to be largely an ice-free woodland with an understory of angiosperm dominated by dinosaurs. The mean temperature was 5 to 6 °C (41 to 43 °F), with the mean temperature during the cold months being 2 to 4 °C (36 to 39 °F) and the mean temperature during the warm months being 10 to 12 °C (50 to 54 °F). Mean annual precipitation was 500 to 1,500 millimetres (20 to 59 in)/year.[1] The paleolatitude of the formation at the time of deposition was around 80°–85°N, high in the Arctic Circle, and would have likely experienced 120 days of winter darkness.[8]
Vertebrate paleofauna
Dinosaurs
Theropods
Indeterminate tyrannosaurid remains are present, mostly in the form of teeth. The teeth are from the Kikak-Tegoseak Quarry, Liscomb Quarry, and Byers Bed, totaling 8 teeth.[9]
Dental remains,[3] including teeth.[9] Braincases have also been found.[14]
Remains of T. sp. are approximately 50% larger than specimens from Alberta and Montana.[3] Remains were previously assigned to T. formosus.[10] The most abundant theropod.[14] As of 2011, a dubious genus.[15]
An abundance of skeletal remains,[4] including an immature juvenile.[18]
The youngest of the Pachyrhinosaurus species, found in one of the highest latitudes of centrosaurine discoveries.[4] A discovery in the Kikak-Tegoseak Quarry was identified in 2013 as a juvenile of Pachyrhinosaurus perotorum. This discovery shows that the crest started to develop in the front of the snout, then extending farther back until it reaches the eye.[18]
Very abundant in the early Maastrichtian and Indeterminate level of the formation, becoming rarer until the Middle/Late Maastrichtian. Also found in the Schrader Bluff Formation.
^Weishampel, David B; et al. (2004). "Dinosaur distribution (Late Cretaceous, North America)." In: Weishampel, David B.; Dodson, Peter; and Osmólska, Halszka (eds.): The Dinosauria, 2nd, Berkeley: University of California Press. Pp. 574-588. ISBN0-520-24209-2.
^ abcde"3.33 Alaska, United States; 3. Prince Creek Formation," in Weishampel, et al. (2004). Page 587.
^ abcdFiorillo, A. R.; Hasiotis, S. T.; Kobayashi, Y.; Breithaupt, B. H.; McCarthy, P. J. (2011). "Bird tracks from the Upper Cretaceous Cantwell Formation of Denali National Park, Alaska, USA: a new perspective on ancient northern polar vertebrate biodiversity". Journal of Systematic Palaeontology. 9 (1): 33–49. Bibcode:2011JSPal...9...33F. doi:10.1080/14772019.2010.509356.
^ abSullivan, R.M. (2006). "A taxonomic review of the Pachycephalosauridae (Dinosauria: Ornithischia)". New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science Bulletin. 35: 347–365.
^ abcdefgBrown, C.M.; Druckenmiller, P. (2011). "Basal ornithopod (Dinosauria: Ornithischia) teeth from the Prince Creek Formation (early Maastrichtian) of Alaska". Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences. 48 (9): 1342–1354. Bibcode:2011CaJES..48.1342B. doi:10.1139/e11-017.
^ abcdThurston, D.K.; Fujita, K. (1994). 1992 Proceedings, International Conference on Arctic Margins. Anchorage, Alaska: U.S. Dept. of the Interior, Minerals Management Service, Alaska Outer Continental Shelf Region. ISBN978-1125448038.
^Eberle, Jaelyn J.; Clemens, William A.; McCarthy, Paul J.; Fiorillo, Anthony R.; Erickson, Gregory M.; Druckenmiller, Patrick S. (2019-02-14). "Northernmost record of the Metatheria: a new Late Cretaceous pediomyid from the North Slope of Alaska". Journal of Systematic Palaeontology. 17 (21): 1805–1824. Bibcode:2019JSPal..17.1805E. doi:10.1080/14772019.2018.1560369. ISSN1477-2019. S2CID92613824.
Bibliography
Flaig, P.P. (2010). "Depositional Environments of the Late Cretaceous (Maaastrichtian) Dinosaur-Bearing Prince Creek Formation: Colville River Region, North Slope, Alaska". Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertations, the University of Alaska-Fairbanks: 311.
Flaig, P.P.; McCarthy, P.J.; Fiorillo, A.R. (2011). "A Tidally-Influenced, High-Latitude Coastal-Plain: the Upper Cretaceous (Maastrichtian) Prince Creek Formation, North Slope, Alaska". In Stephanie K. Davidson; Sophie Leleu; Colin P. North (eds.). From River to Rock Record: The Preservation of Fluvial Sediments and their Subsequent Interpretation. Vol. 97. Society for Sedimentary Geology. pp. 233–264. doi:10.2110/sepmsp.097.233. ISBN9781565763074.
Flaig, P.P.; Fiorillo, A.R.; McCarthy, P.J. (2014). "Dinosaur-bearing hyperconcentrated flows of Cretaceous Arctic Alaska—Recurring catastrophic event beds on a distal paleopolar coastal plain". PALAIOS. 29 (11): 594–611. Bibcode:2014Palai..29..594F. doi:10.2110/palo.2013.133. S2CID128713816.
Weishampel, David B.; Dodson, Peter; and Osmólska, Halszka (eds.): The Dinosauria, 2nd, Berkeley: University of California Press. 861 pp. ISBN0-520-24209-2.