Late Triassic bivalves associated with a hydrothermal vent system in the Yidun Island Arc (SW China) of the eastern Tethys

Abstract

The Yidun Island Arc in the Three Rivers (Jinsha River, Lancang River, Nujiang River) region of southwestern China is one of the most important Kuroko-type volcanogenic massive sulfide deposits (VMS) in China. Intra-arc rifting of Yidun Island occurred during the Late Carnian-Norian when VMS deposits such as the Gacun Pb-Zn-Cu deposit were formed. A bivalve fauna was found in fine-grained tuffaceous slate and in mineralized tuffaceous siltstone containing very high contents of Pb (45.01–103.37 ppm) and Zn (135.78–300.03 ppm) of the upper Tumugou Formation in the Changtai-Gacun volcanic-sedimentary rift basin. Stratigraphically, the bivalve-bearing beds are equivalents of the Gacun Pb-Zn-Cu deposits. The diversity of this bivalve fauna is very low. It consists mainly of the thin-shelled, epibyssate suspension-feeding bivalves Pergamidia eumenea and Parapergamidia changtaiensis, the burrowing large, elongated, suspension-feeding Trigonodus keuperinus and Unionites? sp., and occasional specimens of the endobyssate suspension-feeding Trigonodus? sp. and the deep burrowing suspension-feeding Pleuromya markiamensis. Individuals of the first four taxa are so abundant that the specimens are sometimes concentrated in shell beds, probably indicating a gregarious habit. This bivalve fauna is associated with internal moulds of cylindrical, slightly conical tubes most likely produced by a worm-shaped organism. Composition, morphology, diversity, and high abundance of this fauna, chemical features of the surrounding sediment, and the tectonic setting all suggest that this bivalve fauna lived in a deep-water environment in or around a hydrothermal vent system.