Code
NUDB
Status
Formal (Rijsdijk et al. 2005).
Lithological description
Very heterogeneous. The deposits of the Dogger Bight Formation are (always) subdivided into members, i.e. the Bolders Bank (glacial till), Dogger Bank (glaciolacustrine sediments), Well Ground (fluvioglacial sediments), Botney Cut (older tunnel valley fills) and Volans (younger tunnel valley fills) members; see descriptions there.
Depositional setting
Glacial (Marine Isotope Stage 2).
Definition of lower boundary
Unconformable, partly sharp contact with shell-bearing marine or deltaic sand and clay (Alkaid Member, Yarmouth Roads Formation; Egmond Ground and Eem formations), glacial deposits (Peelo and Drente formations), (shallow) marine clay (Brown Bank and Eem formations) or periglacial sand (Drachten and Boxtel formations).
Definition of upper boundary
Often sharp contact with shell-bearing tidal sand and clay (Wormer Member, Naaldwijk Formation), shell-bearing marine sediment (Southern Bight or Urania Formation) or periglacial sand (Boxtel Formation). More locally a diffuse transition occurs to a reworked marine layer (Indefatigable Grounds Member, Southern Bight Formation) or marine mud (Well Hole Member, Urania Formation). Partly at the seabed (Cleaver Bank area).
Thickness indication
Highly variable. Maximum up to approximately 60 m in the form of tunnel valley fills.
Geographical distribution
Widespread in the northwestern Dutch continental shelf.
Regional correlation
Netherlands (onshore): absent; UK: Well Ground, Dogger Bank (including Volans Member), Bolders Bank and Botney Cut formations (defined and mapped in consultation with the British Geological Survey; Jeffery et al. 1989 & 1991; Stoker et al. 2011), Wee Bankie Formation (Gatliff et al. 1994), Younger Dogger Bank Formation (Cotterill et al. 2017, Roberts et al. 2018), part of the North Sea Coast Glacigenic Subgroup (McMillan et al. 2011); GER: Limnic-fluvial Schichten (Sindowski 1970); Limnic Fluvial Formation (Coughlan et al. 2018); BEL: absent.
Age
Late Pleistocene (Weichselian).
Type section
Well:
Not yet determined.
Depth (thickness) AH:
Not yet determined.
Origin of name
Named after a bathymetric low west of the Dogger Bank.
Previous name(s)
Merger of the Well Ground (Cameron et al. 1986), Dogger Bank (including the Volans Member; Jeffery et al. 1989 & 1991), Bolders Bank (Laban et al. 1984) and Botney Cut (Laban et al. 1984) formations.
Reviewed by (date)
Geert-Jan Vis (2019), Sytze van Heteren (2021), Marcel Bakker (2025).
References
Cameron, T.D.J., Crosby, A., Balson, P.S., Jeffery, D.H., Lott, G.K., Bulat, J., Harrison, D.J. 1992. United Kingdom offshore Regional Report: the Geology of the Southern North Sea. HMSO for the British Geological Survey, London.
Cameron, T.D.J., Laban, C., Mesdag, C.M., Schüttenhelm, R.T.E. 1986. Indefatigable Sheet 53°N-02°E. Quaternary Geology, 1 : 250 000 Series. British Geological Survey and Geological Survey of the Netherlands.
Cotterill, C.J., Phillips, E., James, L., Forsberg, C.F., Tjelta, T.I., Carter, G., Dove, D. 2017. The evolution of the Dogger Bank, North Sea: a complex history of terrestrial, glacial and marine environmental change. Quaternary Science Reviews, 171, 136-153. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2017.07.006
Coughlan, M., Fleischer, M., Wheeler, A. J., Hepp, D. A., Hebbeln, D., Mörz, T. 2018. A revised stratigraphical framework for the Quaternary deposits of the German North Sea sector: a geological‐geotechnical approach. Boreas, 47, 80-105. https://doi.org/10.1111/bor.12253
Gatliff, R.W., Richards, P.C., Smith, K., Graham, C.C., McCormac, M., Smith, N.J.P., Long, D., Cameron, T.D.J., Evans, D., Stevenson, A.G., Bulat, J. 1994. United Kingdom offshore Regional Report: the Geology of the Central North Sea. HSMO for the British Geological Survey, London.
Jeffery, D.H., Frantsen, P., Laban C., Schüttenhelm, R.T.E. 1989. Silver Well: sheet 54°N/02°E. Quaternary Geology, 1 : 250 000 series British Geological Survey and Geological Survey of the Netherlands.
Jeffery, D.H., Laban, C, Mesdag, C.S., Schuttenhelm, R.T.E. 1991. Dogger: sheet 55°N/02°E. Quaternary Geology, 1 : 250 000 series British Geological Survey and Geological Survey of the Netherlands.
Laban C., Cameron, T.D.J., Schüttenhelm, R.T.E. 1984. Geologie van het Kwartair in de Zuidelijke Bocht van de Noordzee. Mededelingen Werkgroep van Tertiaire en Kwartaire Geologie, 21, 139-154.
McMillan, A.A., Hamblin, R.J.O., Merritt, J.W. 2011. A lithostratigraphical framework for onshore Quaternary and Neogene (Tertiary) superficial deposits of Great Britain and the Isle of Man. British Geological Survey Research Report, RR/10/03, 343 p.
Rijsdijk, K.F., Passchier, S., Weerts, H.J.T., Laban, C., Van Leeuwen, R.J.W., Ebbing, J.H.J. 2005. Revised Upper Cenozoic stratigraphy of the Dutch sector of the North Sea Basin: towards an integrated lithostratigraphic, seismostratigraphic and allostratigraphic approach. Netherlands Journal of Geosciences 84, 129-146. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0016774600023015
Roberts, D.H., Evans, D.J.A., Callard, S.L., Clark, C.D., Bateman, M.D., Medialdea, A., Dove, D., Cotterill, C.J., Saher, M., Ó Cofaigh, C., Chiverrell, R.C., Moreton, S.G., Fabel, D., Bradwell, T. 2018. Ice marginal dynamics of the last British-Irish Ice Sheet in the southern North Sea: Ice limits, timing and the influence of the Dogger Bank. Quaternary Science Reviews, 198, 181-207. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2018.08.010
Sindowski, K.H. 1970. Das Quartär im untergrund der Deutschen Bucht (Nordsee). Eiszeitalter und Gegenwart, 21, 1-18.
Stoker, M.S., Balson, P.S., Long, D., Tappin, D.R. 2011. An overview of the lithostratigraphical framework for the Quaternary deposits on the United Kingdom continental shelf. British Geological Survey Research Report, RR/11/03, 48 p.
Cite as
TNO-GDN ([YEAR]). Dogger Bight Formation. In: Stratigraphic Nomenclature of the Netherlands, TNO – Geological Survey of the Netherlands. Accessed on [DATE] from http://www.dinoloket.nl/en/stratigraphic-nomenclature/dogger-bight-formation.