Slochteren Formation

Sequence of usually red to pale red-brown, occasionally yellow or grey, sandstones and conglomerates with subordinate amounts of intercalated dark red, red-brown or green-grey silty claystones. The sandstones show a wide range of grain sizes, textures and sedimentary structures. The uppermost tens of metres, immediately below the contact with the Zechstein Group, may show a massive, fluidised or brecciated, intensely cemented character (Mijnlieff et al. 2011, Appendix B).

Aeolian - dunes and sand flats (dry, damp and wet). Water-laid - fluvial channel fills (low- and high-sinuous, highly ephemeral to perennial) and sheet floods. The associated fine-grained deposits have been attributed to lakes, interdune ponds and sabkha mudflats.

Unconformably overlies the Limburg Group (or locally volcanics of the Lower Rotliegend Group). In the area of Ameland and Terschelling it conformably overlies a tongue of the Silverpit Formation (Hollum Member or Buren Member).

Overlain by either red-brown claystones of the Silverpit Formation or black bituminous shales of the Coppershale Member of the Z1 (Werra) Formation.