The Upper Old Red Sandstone of Fife and Kinross: a fluviatile sequence with evidence of marine incursion

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Abstract
Synopsis: Arenaceous redbeds in the eastern part of the Stirlingshire-Fife Upper Old Red Sandstone basin are described, and a new system of nomenclature is proposed for the lithostratigraphical units recognized. Sedimentological features, including palaeocurrent data, indicate that deposition was controlled by an eastward-dipping palaeoslope, and that most of the sequence was laid down in fluviatile environments. Evidence is put forward to show that a wedge of sandstone up to about 110 m thick near the top of the sequence represents the deposits of a marine transgression that advanced westwards into the basin, beginning not long after the deposition of a distinctive faunal horizon of Famennian or Tournaisian age. The transgression did not penetrate into the Stirlingshire part of the basin, and the regression, which was accompanied by uplift of the source areas, allowed fluviatile conditions to spread back eastwards into the Fife and Kinross area once more. There may locally be a disconformable relationship between the Upper Old Red Sandstone and the overlying Calciferous Sandstone Measures, but there is no detectable angular unconformity between the two sets of strata.