Maikop Series

(named after the city of Maikop), a stratigraphic subdivision of the late Paleogene and early Neocene systems. It corresponds to the time from the Oligocene to the lowermost strata of the Middle Miocene. It occurs on the white clay suite of the uppermost strata of the Eocene and is overlain by Tarkhan marls of the Middle Miocene. It was identified by the Soviet geologist I. M. Gubkin (1911). On the bottom it is composed of gray clay-marls and marls, while the top is brown noncalcareous clays with jarosite and dolomite concretions and interlayers. There are locally developed interlayers of sandstone. Fossils of fish, Foraminifera, Radiolaria, mollusks, diatoms, and plants are found in the Maikop series. The series contains deposits of oil and gas. In the USSR it is found in the Crimea, the Black Sea region, the Caucasus, on Mangyshlak, and in Turkmenia.