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2ANTARCTIC JOURNAL

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glaciers may be advancing eastward, although slowly(Denton et al., 1970), have to be explained by someincreased local precipitation on the valley glaciersthemselves or on the isolated and immediately adja-cent high area of the Victoria Land Ice Plateau.There seems to be little evidence that crestal thresh-olds are being actively lowered by erosion and hencethat more discharge from the plateau is allowed toreach the termini of the outlet glaciers here.

Subglacial information assembled from radio-echosoundings in this area is presented elsewhere byCalkin (1971, 1973, and in press). Analysis of bothsurface and subsurface information was supported byNational Science Foundation grant Gv-22761; theuse of facilities and the assistance in data reductionat the Scott Polar Research Institute are gratefullyacknowledged.

References

Calkin, P. E. 1971. Radio-echo sounding records fromsouthern Victoria Land. Antarctic Journal of the U.S.,VI(5): 208-209.

Calkin, P. E. 1973. Subglacial geomorphology and glacialhistory, southern Victoria Land, Antarctica. Ninth Con-gress, International Union for Quaternary Research,Abstracts, Christchurch, New Zealand. p. 53-54.

Calkin, P. E. In press. Subglacial geomorphology surroundingthe ice-free valleys of southern Victoria Land, Antarctica.Journal of Glaciology.

Crary, A. P. 1963. Results of U. S. traverses in East Ant-arctica, 1958-1961. ICY Glaciological Report, 7. NewYork, American Geographical Society. 144 p.

Denton, G. H., R. L. Armstrong, and M. Stuiver. 1970.Late Cenozoic glaciation in Antarctica: the record in theMcMurdo Sound region. Antarctic Journal of the U.S.,V(1): 15-21.

Gunn, B. M., and G. Warren. 1962. Geology of VictoriaLand between the Mawson and Mulock glaciers, Ant-arctica. New Zealand Geological Survey. Bulletin, 71.l57p.

Food chain relationships in ancientfreshwater ecosystems of Antarctica

PAUL TASCHDepartment of GeologyWichita State UniversityWichita, Kansas 67208

Lacking primary producers, the base of the foodchain in Paleozoic-Mesozoic ponds and/or lakes ofAntarctica is inferred to have been plant tissue andmicroorganisms. Crustaceans dominated among in-vertebrates. Mesozoic insects were of two types offeeders: phytophagous and predaceous, e.g. beetlespreyed on crustaceans. Crustaceans often were micro-phagous or bottom detritus feeders; they also preyedon each other. Fish, where present, consumed insectfood and/or preyed on crustaceans. A predator-preyarrangement thus characterized these ancient eco-systems (Tasch, 1974).

Several beetle elytra (fig. 1) were uncovered insamples from Carapace Nunatak, Tasch station 1,some 300 meters south of station 2, where carbonizedelytra were reported earlier (Tasch, 1973). Thesewere associated with conchostracans and ostracodvalves. Numerous eumalacostràcans and other crusta-ceans (syncarids, fig. 2; notostracans, fig. 3, amongothers) have been found in samples from station 2,and station 1 (150 meters south of station 2).

X-ray diffraction analysis of a fossiliferous rocksample from Mauger Nunatak (by Dr. Dah ChengWu) showed, in order of abundance, quartz, zeolites(heulandite or an intermediate), and montmorillonite.Similar rocks of this section therefore are classifiableas zeolitic silty mudstone or shale.

At Storm Peak, the lower flow fossiliferous inter-beds had an annual sedimentation rate of 0.66 to1.45 millimeters; upper flow fossiliferous interbeds(273 meters above the lower flow interbed) had arate of 0.57 to 1.57 millimeters. These figures, strik-ingly close, suggest no change in sedimentation con-ditions across the time interval separating the twointerbeds. This parallels analytical data developedthus far that indicate persistence of the basic eco-system structure as well.

Work continues on the Newcastle Coal measures(New South Wales) collection. Recently completedis the faunal-paleoecological study of nonmarinearthropods of the Tasmanian Triassic for whichProfessor Max Banks, University of Tasmania, willprovide the stratigraphic context. Data suggest cor-relation of conchostracan-bearing beds of the Knock-lofty formation (Triassic) with those of the Aus-tralian mainland, and the Indian Triassic (Tasch, inpreparation).

References

Taseh, P. 1973. Jurassic beetle from southern Victoria Land,Antarctica. Journal of Paleontology, 47(3) 509-591,fig. 1.

Tasch, P. 1974. Ancient precursors of modern antarcticfreshwater ecosystems. SCAR/IUBS third symposium onantarctic biology, 26-30 August 1974. Abstract. Washing-ton, D.C., National Academy of Sciences. p. 64.

Tasch, P. In preparation. Nonrriarine arthropod fauna ofthe Tasmanian Triassic (with a section on "stratigraphicsetting, by M. R. Banks).

Figure 1 (opposite center). Beetle elytra. (a)Length, 3.1 millimeters; Carapace Nunatak, Taschstation 1, bed lb (composite photo). (b) Carbon-ized specimen; length, 3.5 millimeters; idem,Tasch station 0 (±7 meters south of station 1).Figure 2 (opposite right). Eumalacostracan syn-card; abdomen with three somites and fan-shapeduropod (arrow); Carapace Nunatak, Tasch station2, bed 1; height of carbonized fragment, 2.55centimeters (composite photo). Figure 3 (oppositeleft). Notostracan. (a) Carbonized abdomen withfo.Ir spine-bearing body rings, displaced telsonanJ caudal filaments (arrow); note lack of supra-angll plate (Trops sp.); Carapace Nunatak, Taschstation 2, bed 1; width of body ring, 3.0 milli-mele rs (composite photo). (b) Detail of caudalflldments from same specimen; length, 1.05 milli-

meters.

Sptember-October 1974

Zirconium concentrations and initialstrontium-87/strontium-86 ratios,

Kirkpatrick basalt, Storm Peak,Queen Alexandra Range

G. FAURE, L. B. OWEN, J . R. BOWMAN,and D. H. ELLIOT

Department of Geology and MineralogyInstitute of Polar StudiesThe Ohio State University

Columbus, Ohio 43210The concentrations of zirconium in basalt from

Storm Peak, Queen Alexandra Range, TransantarcticMountains, exhibit systematic stratigraphic variationsand correlate positively with initial strontium-87/strontium-86 ratios. This correlation is incompatiblewith magmatic differentiation in a closed system andis indicative of contamination of a parent basaltmagma with granitic material having a high zir-conium concentration and a high strontium-87/strontium-86 ratio.

Storm Peak (84°35'S. 163°55'E.) is capped by 12basalt flows with a total thickness of about 525 meters.The stratigraphy and petrography of these flows aredescribed by Elliot (1970, 1972), and Faure et al.(1972, in press) discuss their petrogenesis based onchemical and strontium isotope data. We now reportconcentrations of zirconium determined by x-rayfluorescence spectrometry of 18 samples. A calibra-tion was obtained by means of U.S. Geological Sur-vey rock standards (Flanagan, 1973) and included acorrection for interference of strontium-K P radiationwith zirconium-K a radiation. The average differencebetween 10 duplicate determinations is about 2 per-cent and the accuracy of the zirconium concentrationsis believed to be better than 10 percent. The resultsare shown in the table.

The zirconium concentrations range from 81 to 220parts per million and have a mean of 174 ± 35 partsper million (one standard deviation for 18 samples).This value is high when compared to the data com-piled by Prinz (1967), who found an arithmeticmean value of 111 parts per million and a range from20 to 335 parts per million in 146 analyses of quartz-normative tholeiites.

Part A of the figure is a schematic plot of the aver-age zirconium concentrations of the flows versus theflow number, counting from the bottom up. Thereare three sharp discontinuities that separate four setsof flows exactly as shown earlier by Faure et at. (inpress) on the basis of all of the major oxides andstrontium concentrations. These sets of flows are iden-tified by Roman numerals and are interpreted as epi-sodes of volcanic and petrogenetic processes.

Part B of the figure is a plot of the initial stron-tium-87/strontium-86 ratios of the samples (corrected

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