Blue Beach - Horton Bluff

Introduction

The location and geological setting of the Blue Beach area are shown in Figures 1 and 2.From the parking lot near the Blue Beach Fossil Museum, take the short trail to Blue Beach. Once on the beach, note that the headland to the northwest is Horton Bluff, which can be reached from Blue Beach at low tide.

Figure 1. Geology map of the Avon River and Noel Shore area of Nova Scotia. Courtesy R. Raeside (pers. comm.), 2004.

The late Devonian through Permian Maritimes Basin was made up of several smaller interconnected "sub-basins". The section at Blue Beach and Horton Bluff is located in one of these "sub-basins" (which are confusingly usually formally named as "basins"), the Minas Basin (not to be confused with the modern bay also called the Minas Basin.

Figure 2. Location map of Blue Beach. Modified from Martel (1990)

The rocks exposed along the shore at Blue Beach and Horton Bluff belong to the Horton Group, and consist of sedimentary rocks that formed in the latest Devonian to early Carboniferous (see Regional Geology).

The Horton Group was deposited in several of the Maritimes Basin's sub-basins that formed in Nova Scotia and southern New Brunswick as a result of faulting along the Cobequid-Chedabucto and related fault systems.

At Blue Beach, two formations of Horton Group rocks can be seen: the Cheverie Formation, mostly a sandstone, to the southeast (Fig. 3); and the Horton Bluff Formation (Fig. 4). The rocks of the Horton Bluff Formation were deposited in a very large wave-dominated lake or a restricted marine bay that was filled periodically with sediments from rivers and deltas. The Horton Bluff Formation contains many well-preserved sedimentary structures and fossils, as described in "Rocks at Blue Beach" and "Fossils at Blue Beach"

Figure 3. Cheverie Formation just south of Blue Beach. Photograph courtesy of W. MacMillan

Figure 4. Horton Bluff Formation at Blue Beach. Photograph courtesy of R. Fensome.

Last Modified: 2004-12-10