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Tlayúa Formation
Stratigraphic range: Albian–Cenomanian PreꞒ Ꞓ O S D C P T J K Pg N
Type	Geological formation
Sub-units	Lower, Middle and Upper Members
Underlies	Unconformity with Eocene-Oligocene Pie de Vaca Formation
Overlies	Orizaba Formation
Thickness	Lower: 50 m Middle: 35 m Upper: 40 m
Lithology
Primary	Limestone
Other	Mudstone
Location
Coordinates	19°06′N 98°12′W / 19.1°N 98.2°W / 19.1; -98.2
Approximate paleocoordinates	17°06′N 61°36′W / 17.1°N 61.6°W / 17.1; -61.6
Region	Puebla
Country	Mexico
Type section
Named for	Tlayúa Quarry
Tlayúa Formation (Mexico)

The Tlayúa Formation is an Cretaceous Konservat-Lagerstätte near Tepexi de Rodríguez, Puebla, Central Mexico. It consists of three members (Lower, Middle and Upper), spanning the lower Albian of the Early Cretaceous to the lower Cenomanian of the Late Cretaceous. It consists of a series of limestone quarries that preserve lagoonal palaeoenvironments, such as a shelf lagoon, a shallow lagoon surrounded by a penneplain, and a tidal flat. It is notable for preserving high quantities of vertebrate and invertebrate fossils, and is thus considered a Lagerstätte.

Description

The Tlayúa Formation was first described by Jerjes Pantoja-Alor in 1992. It is located in the Tlayúa ravine, which itself lies in the southern portion of Puebla, Central Mexico, near Tepexi de Rodríguez, and consists of a series of limestone quarries that has seen commercial use for decades.

Stratigraphy

The Tlayúa Formation consists of two stratigraphic units (Tlayúa and Barranca Abuelo) and three members. The Lower Member is lower Albian in age. It consists of bioturbated limestones, and is characterised by the presence of the non-rudist bivalve Chondrodonta and the rudist bivalve Toucasia polygyra. The Middle Member, corresponding to the Tlayúa Quarry, is the most fossiliferous. Its age has been difficult to ascertain, as the foraminiferan Spiroloculina cretacea is known exclusively from lower Cenomanian strata, though it has since been determined to be Upper Albian. The Middle Member consists of fine-grained lithographic limestones, interspersed with hematitic layers that preserve its vertebrate fauna. The Upper Member is Cenomanian in age, and consists of a sequence of dolomites. It is characterised by the presence of the miliolid foraminiferan Dicyclina schlumbergi.

Depositional environments

The depositional environment of the Tlayúa Formation was likely a shallow, coastal lagoon, with some freshwater influence, as indicated by the presence of crocodilian and turtle fossils. The Lower Member of the Tlayúa Formation represents a carbonate environment which apparently had stressed biodiversity. The depositional environment of the Middle Member was likely arid for much of the year, with the exception of seasonal rains and storms. The Upper Member likely represents a tidal flat. The Tlayúa Formation may have been part of an island, though a connection to the North American mainland cannot be discounted.

Paleobiota

The formation contains a diverse array of vertebrate and invertebrate fossils. For this reason, it is considered a Konservat-Lagerstätte. About 70% of the macrofossils are osteichthyan fish. Other vertebrates include chelonians, pterosaurs, lepidosaurs, and crocodiles. Cyanobacteria, foraminifera, algae, gymnosperms, sponges, cnidarians, annelids, gastropods, ammonites, bivalves, arachnids, insects, isopods, anomurans, brachyurans, crinoids, echinoids, holothuroids, stelleroids, and ophiuroids, have also been recovered from the Tlayúa Formation.

Archelosaurs

The remains of several indeterminate archelosaur taxa have been recovered from the Tlayúa Formation. Indeterminate crocodilians and turtles have been identified. Partial, articulated wings of an unidentified pterosaur have been discovered from the formation. Though tentatively assigned to Pteranodon sp. and Nyctosaurus sp. in 2008, they likely represent either an early azhdarchoid or an indeterminate ornithocheiromorph.

Lepidosaurs

Genus	Species	Material	Notes
Huehuecuetzpalli	H. mixtecus	Near-complete specimens of an adult and a juvenile	A primitive lizard
Pamizinsaurus	P. tlayuaensis	A single, crushed skull of a juvenile	An osteoderm-covered sphenodontian
Ankylosphenodon	A. pachyostosus	Front half of a partial skeleton	An aquatic sphenodontian
Tepexisaurus	T. tepexii	Near-complete skeleton, minus the tail	A basal scincomorph

Fish

Mainly after González-Rodríguez (2016) and Applegate et al. (2006)

Arthropods

Mollusks

Inoceramus sp.
Pectinidae indet.
Osteridae indet.
Gastropoda indet.
Neohibolites minimus obtusus
Neohibolites minimus pinguis
Neohibolites minimus claviformis
Neohibolites praeultimus
Mesohibolites semicanaliculatus
Martoniceras sp.
Hysteroceras sp.
Anisoceras sp.

Echinoderms

Other invertebrates

Plants

References

^ Applegate, S. (1988). "A new genus and species of a holostean belonging to the family Ophiopsidae, Teoichthys kallistos, from the Cretaceous, near Tepexi de Rodriguez, Puebla" (PDF). Revista Mexicana de Ciencias Geológicas. 7 (2): 200–205.
Pantoja-Alor, Jerjes (1992). "Geología y paleoambiente de la Cantera Tlayúa, Tepexi de Rodríguez Estado de Puebla". Rev. Instituto Geol. UNAM. 9 (2): 156–169.
^ Applegate, Shelton P.; Espinosa-Arrubarrena, Luis; Alvarado-Ortega, Jesús; Benammi, Mouloud (2006), Vega, Francisco J.; Nyborg, Torrey G.; Perrilliat, María Del Carmen; Montellano-Ballesteros, Marisol (eds.), "Revision of Recent Investigations in the Tlayúa Quarry", Studies on Mexican Paleontology, Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands, pp. 275–304, doi:10.1007/1-4020-3985-9_13, ISBN 978-1-4020-3985-0, retrieved 2024-07-16
^ Juárez-Arriaga, Edgar; Barragán, Ricardo; Núñez-Useche, Fernando; Moreno-Bedmar, Josep A. (2023-11-01). "Sedimentary environments in the prelude to the lagerstätten conditions of the Tlayúa Formation (Albian) in central Mexico: A microfacies approach". Journal of South American Earth Sciences. 131: 104650. doi:10.1016/j.jsames.2023.104650. ISSN 0895-9811.
Chiocchini, Maurizio; Mancinelli, Anna; Romano, Antonio (1984). "Stratigraphic distribution of benthic Foraminifera in the Aptian, Albian and Cenomanian carbonate sequences of the Aurunci and Ausoni Mountains (Southern Lazio, Italy)". Benthos Research. 1: 167–181.
^ Juárez-Aguilar, E. Aldrin; Sánchez-Beristain, Francisco; Bernal, Juan Pablo; Morton-Bermea, Ofelia; García-Barrera, Pedro (2025-03-01). "Palaeoenvironmental inferences of a Mexican Konservat-Lagerstätte (Tlayúa Quarry; Lower Cretaceous) based on the geochemistry of rare earth elements". Cretaceous Research. 167: 106045. doi:10.1016/j.cretres.2024.106045. ISSN 0195-6671.
^ Espinosa-Arrubarrena, Luis; Applegate, Shelton Pleasants (1996). "A paleoecological model of the vertebrate bearing beds in the Tlayúa Quarries, near Tepexi de Rodriguez, Puebla, Mexico". In Arriata, Gloria; Viohl, Günter (eds.). Mesozoic Fishes – Systematics and Paleoecology. Proceedings of the International Meeting Eichstätt. pp. 539–550. ISBN 9783923871902.
Espinosa-Arrubarrena, Luis; Applegate, Shelton Pleasants (1996). "A paleoecological model of the vertebrate bearing beds in the Tlayúa Quarries, near Tepexi de Rodriguez, Puebla, Mexico". In Arriata, Gloria; Viohl, Günter (eds.). Mesozoic Fishes – Systematics and Paleoecology. Proceedings of the International Meeting Eichstätt. pp. 539–550. ISBN 9783923871902.
Alvarado-Ortega J, González-Rodríguez KA, Blaco-Piñón A, Espinosa-Arrubarrena L, Ovalles-Damián E (2006). "Mesozoic Osteichthyans of Mexico". In Vega, FJ, TG Nyborg, MC Perrilliat, M. Montellano-Ballesteros, SRS Cevallos-Ferriz. (eds.). Studies on Mexican Paleontology, Topics on Geobiology 24. Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer Verlag. pp. 169–207. ISBN 1402039859.
^ Vega FJ, Bruce NL, Serrano L, Bishop GA, Perrilliat MD (2005). "A review of the Lower Cretaceous (Tlayúa Formation: Albian) Crustacea from Tepexi de Rodríguez, Puebla, Central Mexico" (PDF). Bulletin of the Mizunami Fossil Museum (32): 25–30. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-06-12.
Buitrón-Sánchez, Blanca Estela; Durán-Gónzalez, Alicia; Martín-Cao-Romero, Carolina; Solís-Marín, Francisco Alonso; Laguarda-Figueras, Alfredo. "Lower Cretaceous (Albian) Asteroidea (Echinodermata) from Tepexi de Rodriguez, Puebla, Mexico". Revista de Biología Tropical. 63 (2): 7–15.
Solé, Jesús; Pi-Puig, Teresa; Bermúdez-Chávez, Cynthia; Garduño-Martínez, Diana; Alvarado-Ortega, Jesús (2022-12-05). "Mineralogy, geochemistry, and K-Ar dating of feldspars and clays from an exceptional Cretaceous fossil locality (Tlayúa, Puebla, Mexico): Insights into the depositional and diagenetic ages and processes". Chemical Geology. 612: 121134. doi:10.1016/j.chemgeo.2022.121134. ISSN 0009-2541.
Barrett, Paul M.; Butler, Richard J.; Edwards, Nicholas P.; Milner, Andrew R. (2008). "Pterosaur distribution in time and space: an atlas" (PDF). Zitteliana Reihe B: Abhandlungen der Bayerischen Staatssammlung fur Palaontologie und Geologie. 28: 61–107.
Rivera-Sylva, Héctor E.; Carpenter, Kenneth; Frey, Eberhard (2014). Dinosaurs and other reptiles from the Mesozoic of Mexico. Life of the past. Bloomington: Indiana university press. ISBN 978-0-253-01183-1.
Reynoso, V.-H. (29 March 1998). "Huehuecuetzpalli mixtecus gen. et sp. nov: a basal squamate (Reptilia) from the Early Cretaceous of Tepexi de Rodríguez, Central México". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. 353 (1367): 477–500. doi:10.1098/rstb.1998.0224. JSTOR 56466. PMC 1692218.
Reynoso, Victor-Hugo (1997-04-16). "A "beaded" sphenodontian (Diapsida: Lepidosauria) from the Early Cretaceous of central Mexico". Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. 17 (1): 52–59. doi:10.1080/02724634.1997.10010953. ISSN 0272-4634.
Reynoso, V. H. (2000). "An Unusual Aquatic Sphenodontian (Reptilia: Diapsida) from the Tlayua Formation (Albian), Central Mexico". Journal of Paleontology. 74 (1): 133–148. doi:10.1017/S0022336000031310. JSTOR 1306891.
Vega, Francisco J.; Nyborg, Torrey G.; María del Carmen Perrilliat; Marisol Montellano-Ballesteros; Sergio R.S Cevallos-Ferriz; Sara A. Quiroz-Barroso (2006). "Research on Fossil Amphibians and Reptiles". In Landman, Neil H. (ed.). Studies on Mexican Paleontology. Vol. 24. Douglas S. Jones. Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer. p. 214. ISBN 1-4020-3882-8. Retrieved 31 May 2011.
Rodríguez, Katia González; Fielitz, Christopher. "CRETACEOUS OSTEICHTHYAN FISH ASSEMBLAGES FROM MEXICO". Cretaceous Period: Biotic Diversity and Biogeography. New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science Bulletin. 71.