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Sedimentology and provenance of the Upper Jurassic Naknek Formation, Talkeetna Mountains, Alaska: Bearings on the accretionary tectonic history of the Wrangellia composite terrane

Jeffrey M. Tropaff^,1, Darren A. Szuch^,1, Matthew Rioux^,2 and Robert B. Blodgett^#,3

¹ Department of Geology, Bucknell University, Lewisburg, Pennsylvania 17837, USA
² Department of Geological Sciences, University of California, Santa Barbara, California 93106, USA
³ U.S. Geological Survey, 4200 University Drive, Anchorage, Alaska 99508, USA

Analysis of the Upper Jurassic Naknek Formation in the Talkeetna Mountains, Alaska, documents synorogenic sedimentation in a forearc basin along the outboard (southern) margin of the allochthonous Peninsular terrane during accretion to the western North American continental margin. New geochronologic, sedimentologic, and compositional data define a two-part stratigraphy for the Naknek Formation. Microfossil, megafossil, and U-Pb clast ages document early Oxfordian to early Kimmeridgian deposition of the lower 690 m of the Naknek Formation and early Kimmeridgian to early Tithonian deposition of the upper 225 m of the Naknek Formation. Lithofacies and paleocurrent data from the lower Naknek Formation demonstrate initial deposition on a high-gradient, southward-dipping basin floor. Submarine mass flows deposited poorly sorted, cobbl-boulder conglomerate in proximal fan-delta environments. Gravelly mass flows transformed downslope into sandy turbidity currents on a muddy pro-delta slope. During early Kimmeridgian to early Tithonian time, fan-delta environments were replaced by lower gradient marine shelf environments characterized by deposition of cross-stratified sandstone and bioturbated mudstone. Sourc-diagnostic clasts, feldspathic sandstone compositions, southward-directed paleocurrent indicators, and U-Pb zircon ages of plutonic clasts (167.6 ± 0.3 Ma; 166.5 ± 0.2 Ma, 164–159 Ma, 156.2 ± 0.4 Ma) indicate that the Naknek Formation was derived primarily from volcanic and plutonic source terranes exposed along the northern basin margin in the southern Talkeetna Mountains. Geologic mapping documents the Little Oshetna fault, a newly identified northward-dipping reverse fault that bounds the northern margin of the Naknek Formation in the Talkeetna Mountains. The concentration of boulder-rich mass-flow deposits in the foot-wall of the fault in combination with geochronologic and compositional data suggest that sedimentation was coeval with Late Jurassic shortening along the fault and exhumation of plutonic source terranes exposed in the hanging wall of the fault. From a regional perspective, coars-grained forearc sedimentation and pluton exhumation along the outboard (southern) segment of the Peninsular terrane were coeval with crustal-scale shortening and synorogenic sedimentation in retroarc basins along the inboard (northern) margin of the Wrangellia terrane (Kahiltna, Nutzotin, and Wrangell Mountains basins). We interpret the regional and synchronous nature of Late Jurassic crustal-scale deformation and synorogenic sedimentation in south-central Alaska as reflecting either initial collision of the Wrangellia and Peninsular terranes with the former continental margin of western North America or amalgamation of the two terranes prior to collision.

Key Words: Alaska • forearc basin • Naknek Formation • Peninsular terrane • sedimentology • Wrangellia terrane

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