A new mound-building biota from the lower Carboniferous of Alabama

A small (1.2 m) columnar carbonate mound in shaley strata equivalent to the Hartselle Sandstone (lower Serpukhovian) near Woodville in northeastern Alabama was built by a consortium of species unlike those of other Carboniferous mounds in the southeastern United States. The mound contains a new problematic microencruster, Aphralysia anfracta n. sp., along with encrusting bryozoans (Fistulipora M'Coy, 1849), nonskeletal microbes, and other microencrusters, including Aphralysia capriorae Mamet and Roux 1975, in a carbonate mud matrix. Mound cavities are filled with three generations of carbonate and siliciclastic sediment. Other biotic constituents of the mound include oncoids, sponges (including Pileospongia Rigby et al., 1979), gastropods, crinoids, a tabulate coral, and coenobionts, including coccoid calcimicrobes. The mound biota, especially the microencrusters, is dramatically different from those of other Serpukhovian mounds that have been described from Alabama (made by various con...