Calvert Formation
GM26 Geologic Map of the Cecilton and Middletown Quadrangles, Delaware
Mapping was conducted using field maps at a scale of 1:12,000 with 2-ft contours. Stratigraphic boundaries drawn at topographic breaks reflect detailed mapping using contours not shown on this map. Most stratigraphic units mapped in stream valleys are projected from subsurface data. Except for a few erosional bluffs, these units are covered by colluvium. This map supersedes Geology of the Middletown-Odessa Area, Delaware: Delaware Geological Survey Geologic Map Series No. 2 (Pickett and Spoljaric, 1971).
RI82 Southern New Castle – Northern Kent Counties Groundwater Monitoring Project: Results of Subsurface Exploration and Hydrogeological Studies
The Delaware Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control, completed a groundwater-monitoring, infrastructure-construction, and data-collection project in southern New Castle and northern Kent Counties, Delaware.
GM24 Geologic Map of the Millington, Clayton and Smyrna Quadrangles, Delaware
The geological history of the surficial units of the Clayton, Smyrna, and the Delaware portion of the Millington Quadrangles are the result of deposition of the Beaverdam Formation and its modification by erosion and deposition of the Columbia Formation during the early Pleistocene. These units were then modified by the Lynch Heights and Scotts Corners Formations as a result of sea-level fluctuations during the middle to late Pleistocene. The geology is further complicated by periglacial activity that produced Carolina Bay deposits in the map area, which modified the land surface.
East Dover Groundwater Flow Model
In 2015, staff of the DNREC Water Supply Section made DGS aware of a situation east of Dover where there is potential for overpumping of the Columbia aquifer by the City of Dover’s Long Point Road wellfield (LPRW) and numerous large-capacity irrigation wells in the surrounding area (Figure 1).
Marine Mammals: Phylum Chordata
The Pollack Farm Site, in the Cheswold sands of the lower Miocene Calvert Formation, produced a fragmentary marine mammal fauna. The Pollack location yielded at least six cetaceans (whales, porpoises), a sirenian(manatee), along with one of the earliest records of a true seal (Listed below).
Land Mammals: Phylum Chordata
Land mammal fossils were discovered in 1992 in the lower part of the Calvert formation at the Pollack Farm site. During the short time the pit was open, the collection grew to become the most diverse tertiary land mammal fauna known north of Florida on the eastern half of North America.
Birds: Phylum Chordata
The lower Miocene Pollack Farm Fossil Site has yielded few avian fossils in comparison to the other classes of vertebrates and invertebrates. Only eleven fossil fragments, assignable to six taxa, were collected at the Pollack site. Of the eleven avian fossils collected, representations from three distinctive orders were recovered: Gaviiformes (divers and loons, seen below), Charadriiformes (gulls and shore birds), Pelecaniformes (cormorants and pelicans).
Reptiles: Phlyum Chordata
The Pollack Farm Site has provided the first legitimate window of Miocene reptilian life in North America east of the great plains and north of Florida. In years prior to the excavation of the Pollack site, records of particular small lizards and snakes were non-existent in locations of the mid-Atlantic and northeast, thus providing a significant value to the Miocene fossils recovered.