Late Cretaceous/Early Paleocene Biostratigraphy of the Northern Portion of the Bornu Basin, Nigeria

Abstract

Ditch cutting samples from Kasade-1 well were processed for microfauna, nannofossil and palynomorphs to throw more light on biostratigraphic events in the northern portion of the Bornu Basin, Nigeria. The lower section of the well within interval 990 - 1565 m yielded fairly abundant foraminifera species, while the upper section was barren. Palynomorph distribution follows the same pattern as observed for foraminifera except that few fresh-water algal species, Botryococcus braunii , were recovered from the upper section. The samples are devoid of nannofossil but contain few ostracod species, echinoid remains and fish tooth. Recognition of two planktonic foraminifera zones, Globotruncanella havanensis and Globotruncana aegyptiaca , enabled the delineation of the Campano-Maastrichtian and Maastrichtian boundary. The Cretaceous Tertiary boundary was inferred based on the top occurrence of palynomorph Dinogymnium euclaense. An abrupt truncation in the distribution of foraminifera species at a depth of about 990 m suggests unconformity, a widely reported event that followed the Santonian squeeze in the entire mega-Chad Basin.