Article: Lower Carboniferous conodont faunas from north-east Devonshire

Two distinct successions, the Bampton and the Westleigh, exist in the Lower Carboniferous of northeast Devonshire. The characters of the two are briefly described, mainly on the basis of field evidence. Conodonts reinforce earlier suggestions that these successions both belong in cuII and cuIII of the Lower Carboniferous. The conglomeratic limestones in the Westleigh succession include some apparently shelf-derived clasts. The conodonts indicate that these coarse limestones (with Gnathodus bilineatus.) have received an admixture of distinctly earlier forms (Scaliognathus anchoralis, siphonodellids). If the reworked forms have come from shelf situations, as much as 800 m of Lower Carboniferous shelf-stratigraphy might have contributed conodonts to the Westleigh succession. The Westleigh Limestone and the Hellefelder Kalk (Lower Carboniferous, Sauerland, Germany) are briefly compared.