AGE AND IMPLICATIONS OF EARLY ORDOVICIAN (ARENIG) PLUTONISM IN THE TYPE AREA OF THE BAY-DU-NORD GROUP, DUNNAGE ZONE, SOUTHERN NEWFOUNDLAND APPALACHIANS

In south Newfoundland, an extensive tract of metamorphosed Ordovician metavolcanic, metasedimentary, and granitoid rocks (Bay du Nord Group) lies north of a late Precambrian basement inlier of peri-Gondwanan affinity, separated from the latter by Silurian rocks. In the Bay du Nord Group type area, the metavolcanic and metasedimentary rocks were ductilely sheared and locally fault imbricated with metagabbro prior to emplacement of the Baggs Hill Granite, herein dated at 477.6 +/- 1.8 Ma. Some of the volcano-sedimentary strata within this succession, however, contain foliated clasts of Baggs Hill Granite, and these strata must comprise a younger stratigraphic sequence which, in this area, is thrust northwestward over the older rocks. The pre-477.6 +/- 1.8 Ma tectonic interleaving of the Dunnage Zone gabbro and stratified rocks is significantly earlier than the Llandovery (early Salinic) recumbent folding and thrusting of Middle Ordovician Exploits Subzone rocks in the east-central Hermitage Flexure. In both areas, the Dunnage Zone rocks were inhomogeneously thickened and tectonically telescoped north of a rigid block of late Precambrian peri-Gondwanan basement. The emplacement of the Baggs Hill Granite is coeval with intrusion of similar Ordovician granite into ophiolites obducted southeastward onto the Gondwanan margin during Arenigian (Penobscot) orogenesis.