Ashfield Shale: Difference between revisions

 

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”’Ashfield Shale”’ is part of the [[Wianamatta shale|Wianamatta group]] of [[sedimentary rock]]s in the [[Sydney Basin]]. It lies directly on contemporaneously eroded [[Hawkesbury sandstone]] or the [[Mittagong formation]]. These rocks were formed in the [[Triassic]] [[Period (geology)|Period]].<ref name=Packham>{{cite book|editor-last=Packham|editor-first=Gordon Howard|title=The Geology of New South Wales|date=November 1969|publisher=Geological Society of Australia|location=Sydney|pages=417–421}}</ref> Ashfield Shale is generally a dark, nearly black, [[clay]]-mineral-rich rock that should be distinguished from [[Bringelly Shale]].<ref name=step/> Ashfield Shale has outcrops over many parts of the [[Greater Sydney]] area. Many structures and deep excavations were constructed in Ashfield Shale, in addition to the shale being used as a [[construction material]].<ref name=USYD/>

”’Ashfield Shale”’ is part of the [[Wianamatta shale|Wianamatta group]] of [[sedimentary rock]]s in the [[Sydney Basin]]. It lies directly on contemporaneously eroded [[Hawkesbury sandstone]] or the [[Mittagong formation]]. These rocks were formed in the [[Triassic]] [[Period (geology)|Period]].<ref name=Packham>{{cite book|editor-last=Packham|editor-first=Gordon Howard|title=The Geology of New South Wales|date=November 1969|publisher=Geological Society of Australia|location=Sydney|pages=417–421}}</ref> Ashfield Shale is generally a dark, nearly black, [[clay]]-mineral-rich rock that should be distinguished from [[Bringelly Shale]].<ref name=step/> Ashfield Shale has outcrops over many parts of the [[Greater Sydney]] area. Many structures and deep excavations were constructed Ashfield Shale, in addition to the shale being used as a [[construction material]].<ref name=USYD/>

Named after the Sydney suburb of [[Ashfield, New South Wales|Ashfield]], some of the early research was performed at the old Ashfield Brickworks Quarry. This rock type is often associated with the [[Inner West]] and [[North Shore (Sydney)|North Shore]] of the city. However, it has also been recorded at [[Penrith, New South Wales|Penrith]], [[Revesby, New South Wales|Revesby]], [[Bilpin, New South Wales|Bilpin]] and [[Mount Irvine, New South Wales|Mount Irvine]]. Ashfield Shale comprises black [[mudstone]]s and grey shales with frequent [[Siderite|sideritic]] [[clay]] [[ironstone]] [[Marine band (geology)|bands]]. The thickness ranges between 45 and 64 metres and has been subdivided into four members that comprise alternating layers of dark ferruginous shale and [[laminite]].<ref name=step>{{cite web|url=https://www.step.org.au/index.php/item/214-wianamatta-group|date=25 Apr 2017|access-date= 5 November 2025|title=Wianamatta Group|publisher=Step Inc}}</ref><ref name=”Packham”/> Ashfield Shale is associated with the [[critically endangered]] [[Blue Gum High Forest]] and [[Sydney Turpentine-Ironbark Forest]].<ref name=Johnson>{{cite web |url= http://www.dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/croydon |title = Croydon | author = John Johnson | year = 2008 |work = Dictionary of Sydney |publisher = Dictionary of Sydney Trust |accessdate = 23 July 2012}}</ref><ref name=”Blue Gum High Forest”>{{cite web|title=Blue Gum High Forest – Typical Form |url=http://www.kmc.nsw.gov.au/resources/documents/attomc22June2010GB.05-B.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110318221516/http://www.kmc.nsw.gov.au/resources/documents/attomc22June2010GB.05-B.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-date=18 March 2011 |work=Mapping and Assessment of Key Vegetation Communities Across the Ku-ring-gai Local Government Area |publisher=Ku-Ring-Gai Council |accessdate=23 July 2012 }}</ref>

Named after the Sydney suburb of [[Ashfield, New South Wales|Ashfield]], some of the early research was performed at the old Ashfield Brickworks Quarry. This rock type is often associated with the [[Inner West]] and [[North Shore (Sydney)|North Shore]] of the city. However, it has also been recorded at [[Penrith, New South Wales|Penrith]], [[Revesby, New South Wales|Revesby]], [[Bilpin, New South Wales|Bilpin]] and [[Mount Irvine, New South Wales|Mount Irvine]]. Ashfield Shale comprises black [[mudstone]]s and grey shales with frequent [[Siderite|sideritic]] [[clay]] [[ironstone]] [[Marine band (geology)|bands]]. The thickness ranges between 45 and 64 metres and has been subdivided into four members that comprise alternating layers of dark ferruginous shale and [[laminite]].<ref name=step>{{cite web|url=https://www.step.org.au/index.php/item/214-wianamatta-group|date=25 Apr 2017|access-date= 5 November 2025|title=Wianamatta Group|publisher=Step Inc}}</ref><ref name=”Packham”/> Ashfield Shale is associated with the [[critically endangered]] [[Blue Gum High Forest]] and [[Sydney Turpentine-Ironbark Forest]].<ref name=Johnson>{{cite web |url= http://www.dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/croydon |title = Croydon | author = John Johnson | year = 2008 |work = Dictionary of Sydney |publisher = Dictionary of Sydney Trust |accessdate = 23 July 2012}}</ref><ref name=”Blue Gum High Forest”>{{cite web|title=Blue Gum High Forest – Typical Form |url=http://www.kmc.nsw.gov.au/resources/documents/attomc22June2010GB.05-B.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110318221516/http://www.kmc.nsw.gov.au/resources/documents/attomc22June2010GB.05-B.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-date=18 March 2011 |work=Mapping and Assessment of Key Vegetation Communities Across the Ku-ring-gai Local Government Area |publisher=Ku-Ring-Gai Council |accessdate=23 July 2012 }}</ref>

Geological formation in Australia

Ashfield Shale is part of the Wianamatta group of sedimentary rocks in the Sydney Basin. It lies directly on contemporaneously eroded Hawkesbury sandstone or the Mittagong formation. These rocks were formed in the Triassic Period.^[2] Ashfield Shale is generally a dark, nearly black, clay-mineral-rich rock that should be distinguished from Bringelly Shale.^[3] Ashfield Shale has outcrops over many parts of the Greater Sydney area. Many structures and deep excavations were constructed on Ashfield Shale, in addition to the shale being used as a construction material.^[4]

Named after the Sydney suburb of Ashfield, some of the early research was performed at the old Ashfield Brickworks Quarry. This rock type is often associated with the Inner West and North Shore of the city. However, it has also been recorded at Penrith, Revesby, Bilpin and Mount Irvine. Ashfield Shale comprises black mudstones and grey shales with frequent sideritic clay ironstone bands. The thickness ranges between 45 and 64 metres and has been subdivided into four members that comprise alternating layers of dark ferruginous shale and laminite.^[3][2] Ashfield Shale is associated with the critically endangered Blue Gum High Forest and Sydney Turpentine-Ironbark Forest.^[5][6]

The chemistry of the rock is typical of shales, with high iron levels, and some iron sulphide and low calcium levels. The geology of the shale lenses within the Hawkesbury Sandstone is chemically similar to the Ashfield Shale.^[2] According to the geological classifications, Ashfield Shale can be classified as a well bound and cemented shale. The Ashfield shale was laid in a shallow marine or brackish environment. The Ashfield shale, which is the basal formation of the Wianamatta group, is the only rock units outcropping in the city area. It has a minimum complete thickness of 44.6 m in the Picton area and a maximum thickness of 62 m near Erskine Park.^[4] It is 20 metres thick at the Sydney Olympic Site.^[7]

Small scale bedding is abundant. The shales are sandy at the top of the sequence. There are up to ten bands in a fifteen-metre section. The fine grained silty sediments were laid down in a low energy, south-east flowing deltaic setting, near the shores of a shallow sea. The Ashfield shale consists of a lower sequence of dark-grey to black, sideritic claystone and siltstone lines which grade upwardly into a fine sandstone and siltstone laminite, and then into the Minchinbury Sandstone which overlies it. Because of weathering, the Ashfield shale is seldom too exposed except in quarry faces. A crucial characteristic of the Ashfield Shale is its relatively high phosphorus content that is between 0.1 and 0.9% P2O5, which tends to be sharp with salient peaks, where it resides in thin beds high in phosphatic siderite nodules.^[3] The porosity ranges between 5% for fresh shale from Surry Hills and Moorebank sites to around 13 % for the Ashfield shale from the Ryde-interchange site.^[4]

The Kellyville laminite is characterised by a clear increase in lithic-quartz sandstone laminations. The Regentville siltstone is made up of black to dark-grey siltstone. In some places, such as south-east of Moss Vale, it progressively becomes more sandy to the top where it is overlain by the Minchinbury sandstone. The Mulgoa laminite is comprises dark-grey siltstone and fine, light-grey sandstone laminae.^[4] The predominant clay minerals recorded in the shale and by earlier researchers are chiefly kaolin and illite, and calcite is relatively rare. Since there is a lack of clay minerals, the swelling in the Ashfield Shale may be due to the uptake of water between grains through the interfaces of the laminations.^[4] Weathering of the shale units produces a reddish/brown podsolic soil, often with poor drainage, such as that in the Cumberland Plain. These clay soils are recognised as being reactive with an appreciable shrink-swell capacity.^[8]

Ashfield Shale outcrops extend to higher elevated areas and into places with higher rainfall than Bringelly Shale, such as the North Shore area where rainfall exceeds 1000 mm, the Bilpin–Mountain Lagoon area and the fringes of the Illawarra escarpment where rainfall may exceed 1500 mm.^[3] Ashfield Shale underlies the Prospect dolerite intrusion in Pemulwuy.^[1] In addition to Scheyville National Park, a more striking exposure of Ashfield Shale is the river-cliff in Mulgoa Nature Reserve, just south of Penrith which presents dark coloured Mulgoa Laminite Member, and as well as the river cliff opposite the Parramatta ferry wharf. The Mulgoa cliff can be observed from Mulgoa Road through the riparian forest, though access by foot is challenging.^[3] Lovering (1954a) and Herbert (1970, 1976) proposed the subdivision of the Ashfield shale into four types, which from the ground upwards include: the Rouse Hill siltstone, the Kellyville laminite, the Regentville siltstone, and the topmost Mulgoa laminite.^[4] The Ashfield Shale covers about 80% of the Blacktown City Council, namely north of the Great Western Highway.^[9]

In Lamb’s Quarry, Rooty Hill, an olivine dolerite dyke intrudes Ashfield Shale.^[9] The rocks found at the Ryde-interchange site usually consist of yellow brown and dark grey shale with light grey silty laminations and lenses. At Moorebank, the Ashfield shale regularly features black to dark grey shales with laminated silty bands. At Surry Hills, they are dark grey, horizontally bedded with coarse light grey and fine grained laminations and lenses.^[4] Natural selection in which the Ashfield Shale is completely exposed is rare. However, it can be seen at railway and roadside cuttings, as well as old quarries. With weathering and exposure, the shale becomes a paler colour. The shale members were once partially exposed in the Thornleigh brick pit, though this has recently been filled in. Today, the most observable faces of Ashfield Shale are found along the North Shore and Northern railway lines and Bells Line of Road, and in several other road cutting exposures, like, Horace Street, St Ives and in the Picton–Campbelltown area.^[3]

The term Ashfield shale has been used to cover siltstone, claystone and laminite.^[4] In the earlier days of Sydney, the Ashfield Shale supported a number of quarries. The shale provided a suitable raw material for brickmaking.^[5] Sydney soils based on shale are not particularly fertile. But at Parramatta they proved more suitable to agriculture than those at Farm Cove, in the early days of the First Fleet. The Wianamatta group rocks, particularly the Ashfield shale, and their weathering stock are important for engineering as they shape the foundations for many buildings of Sydney CBD and Western Sydney. Ashfield shale has also been used for constructing roads.

Notwithstanding, deep excavations in Ashfield Shale can be a risky procedure with the existence of of many fractures. Because the main feature of the unit is the moderately to steeply immersing continuous, planar joints that are often linked with thrust faulting, and these may at times form an unstable wedge when exposed during excavation. If not contained properly, the rock’s wedge may become unstable or skid into the excavation.^[10]

The adjacent Hawkesbury Sandstone is considered a safer bedrock than the (less stable and laminated) Ashfield Shale for building construction. In 2005, the construction of the Lane Cove Tunnel was affected by the collapse of an exit ramp excavation, through Ashfield Shale.^[11] Difficulties may be encountered where the Ashfield Shale interfaces with the Hawkesbury Sandstone and the Mittagong Formation.^[12] The term Ashfield shale has been used to cover siltstone, claystone and laminite.^[4]

Ashfield Shale is considered a freshwater lacustrine paleoenvironment. It was gradually inundated by brackish water, then shallow marine waters over a long period of time.

Fossils are not common in this stratum, however, fossil bivalves, plants, isopods, insects and amphibians have been recorded. One outstanding example being of a Paracyclotosaurus^[2] at St Peters, 2.25 metres long. It is one of the most complete mastodonsaurid skeletons ever recovered. Notobrachyops is a genus of brachyopid temnospondyl amphibian. It is known from a skull roof impression found in the Ashfield Shale at the old Hurstville Brick Company quarry at Mortdale.

The Ashfield Shale has also yielded a shark species, a lungfish species, six species of paleoniscid fish, a species of holostean fish, and a subholostean fish.^[13]