New continental Carboniferous and Permian faunas of Morocco: implications for biostratigraphy, palaeobiogeography and palaeoclimate

Abstract

Abstract Late Palaeozoic sediments in central Morocco and the High Atlas Mountains document the development of this area during the formation of the Mauretanide part of the Hercynian orogeny. Continental basins formed during the Stephanian and Permian. Although scattered in time, they provide valuable biogeographical and climatic information for the Mauretanides as a link between the Variscides in the east, the Appalachians in the west and the Karoo in the south. New blattid insects in the Souss Basin enable correlation to Early Stephanian B. Furthermore, we document the oldest African tetrapod tracks ( Batrachichnus, Dromopus ). Litho- and biofacies indicate seasonally wet and dry phases. Wet red beds of the Khenifra Basin have produced tetrapod bones and the tracks Limnopus, Batrachichnus and Dromopus . Macrofloras give a transitional Autunian/Saxonian age. This fits well into the Artinskian wet phase. Similar facies pattern in the Tiddas Basin are correlated by tetrapod tracks as transitional Artinskian to Kungurian. Advanced tetrapod tracks of Synaptichnium and Rhynchosauroides were discovered in the Ikakern Formation of the Argana Basin, dated by pareiasaur remains as Wuchiapingian. Red beds of similar type are known in Europe, for example, from the Late Permian of the Lodève Basin. They originated during the Wuchiapingian wet phase.