Fossil leaves, woods, gastropods, and a crocodile tooth: Is the Amagá Formation worth exploring?

Abstract

We have generated a spatial framework for macrofossil searching based on the current knowledge of fossil localities and fossil beds reported for the Amagá Formation in the northwestern Andes in Colombia. Our results show that twenty-three fossil localities and ninety-five fossil beds are distributed along this sedimentary succession. Preservation potential is higher in the Lower Member, given the high accommodation space and the dominance of a meandering fluvial system, compared with the Upper Member, where there was less accommodation space with a braided fluvial system controlling it. Our findings show that even though paleontological studies are null in this area, there are several options to find terrestrial macrofossil assemblages that will allow us to investigate the possible biological role of global climatic changes and regional tectonics in the Neotropical biomes based on the Amagá Formation.