Interim report on the ground-water resources of Manatee County, Florida

Abstract

Manatee County comprises an area of about 800 square miles adjacent to the Gulf of Mexico in the southwestern part of the Florida peninsula. The county is underlain at depths ranging from about 200 to 350 feet by a series of limestone formations of Tertiary age having a total thickness of several thousand feet. The upper part of the limestone section consists of the Ocala group of Eocene age, the Suwannee limestone of Oligocene age, and the Tampa formation of early Miocene age. These limestone formations are overlain by the Hawthorn formation of middle Miocene age which consists of interbedded clay, limestone, and sand. The Hawthorn is overlain by undifferentiated deposits of sand, limestone, and shell of Pliocene(?) and Pleistocene age that range in thickness from a few feet to about 75 feet.