The BGS Lexicon of Named Rock Units — Result Details

Solent Catchments Subgroup

Computer Code: SNTCA Preferred Map Code: notEntered
Status Code: Full
Age range: Pleistocene Epoch (QP) — Holocene Epoch (QH)
Lithological Description: Mainly river terrace sand and gravel and alluvial floodplain silt, silty clay and sand, together with related organic and mass movement deposits of the "Solent River" (Frome, Piddle, Stour and Avon) of the Hampshire Basin and Dorset. The Subgroup includes interbedded units of river terraces comprising fossiliferous silty sand, silt, together with organic clay, tufa and peat, which are biostratigraphically correlated with interglacial (warm) stages. The terrace deposits are depicted on British Geological Survey maps using numbered terrace symbols.
Definition of Lower Boundary: Unconformable on Jurassic to Cretaceous strata.
Definition of Upper Boundary: Ground surface.
Thickness: Up to 10m
Geographical Limits: The entire area covered by the catchments of the Hampshire Basin, the Isle of White and Dorset. The subgroup includes deposits of the valleys of the rivers Meon, Hamble, Itchen, Test, Hampshire Avon, Dorset Stour and Frome-Piddle and tributaries draining southwards from the Hampshire Basin and Dorset to the English Channel.
Parent Unit: Britannia Catchments Group (BCAT)
Previous Name(s): Older River Gravel Formation [Obsolete Name and Code: Use SNTCA] (-1193)
Plateau Gravels [Obsolete Name and Code: Use SNTCA] (-1194)
Valley Gravel (VLGR)
Valley Gravel (VLGR)
Alternative Name(s): none recorded or not applicable
Stratotypes:
Type Area  Mainly river terrace sand and gravel and alluvial floodplain silt, silty clay and sand, together with related organic and mass movement deposits of the "Solent River" (Frome, Piddle, Stour and Avon) of the Hampshire Basin and Dorset. Gibbard in Bowen, 1999. 62-65. 
Reference(s):
Gibbard, P L. 1999. South and southeast England. 62-65 in Bowen, D Q (Editor), A revised correlation of Quaternary deposits in the British Isles. Geological Society of London Special Report, No.23. 
Allen, L G, and Gibbard, P L. 1994. Pleistocene evolution of the Solent River of Southern England. Quaternary Science Reviews, Vol. 12, 503-528. 
McMillan, A A, Hamblin, R J O and Merritt, J W. 2005. An overview of the lithostratigraphical framework for the Quarternary and Neogene deposits of Great Britain (onshore). British Geological Survey Research Report RR/04/04. 
Reid, C. 1899. The geology of the country around Dorchester. Memoir of the Geological Survey of Great Britain, Sheet 328 (England and Wales). 
1:50K maps on which the lithostratigraphical unit is found, and map code used:
E314 E315 E316 E328 E329 E330 E331