Provenance and palaeoenvironment of the lower Kerri-Kerri formation around Biri Fulani, North-Eastern Nigeria

Abstract

The Kerri-Kerri formation Around Biri Fulani in North-eastern Nigeria is made up of reddish, modertaley well sorted, quartz arenites that are large scale cross-bedded.  Field studies and laboratory analyses were conducted on these sediments to determine their depositional environments.  Sieve analysis of sediments in the area of study showed that the sandstones within the Kerri-Kerri Formation are very leptokurtic and strongly fine-skewed.  The sediments are texturally submature and mineralogically mature with angular to subrounded grains thus suggesting a moderate degree of reworking. Palaeocurrent analysis showed that the Kerri-Kerri Formation were probably originated from the NE and NW basement Complex of Northern Nigeria.  This is evidenced by the unimodal direction of the azimuth pointing in southerly and south easterly directions.  All these parameters suggest that the sediments of the Kerri-Kerri Formation are products of the fluvial environment.