rich Shale: Bivalve Exploitation of a Nutrient-Rich, Anoxic Sea-floor Environment

very widely distributed unit marking the maximum deep-ening of the Cretaceous epicontinental sea recorded by the infill of the Great Artesian Basin, eastern Australia. It con-sists of organic-rich shale, with TOC ranging to 35%, and limestone as laminae and thin beds comprised of Inocera-mus sutherlandi McCoy and, less commonly, Aucellina hughendenensis Etheridge. Finely interlayered organic-rich shale and coquina are typical of the formation, result-ing in a distinctively black-and-white, thinly bedded to laminated rock. Inoceramus valves are commonly dis-turbed by breakage, reorientation, and imbrication, and, in many cases, have disintegrated into prism horizons. Sedi-mentary laminae show that the sea floor was subject to some current activity, but benthic scavengers are considered to have been active agents of shell disturbance. Althoug