The Merchantville Formation is a clayey glauconite sand. Two, thin glauconite-rich sequences are concatenated at the base of the Merchantville Formation.  These are well expressed lithologically in northern boreholes where inner-middle neritic glauconite sand (transgressive sediments) grades up to inner neritic sand with delta influence (highstand sediments). To the south, highstands are absent, and it is very difficult to distinguish sequence boundaries separating the transgressive sediments. The upper Merchantville, Woodbury and Englishtown formations represents a single cycle of sea-level rise and fall.

The Merchantville Formation is made of green sand-sized grains of the mineral glauconite along with clay and microfossils. Glauconite is typically found at the bases of sequences in New Jersey while sea level is transgressing.

Merchantville

The Woodbury Formation lies conformably above the Merchantville. It is a laminated and lignitic silty clay. It probalby accumulated in a prodeleta environment.

The Englishtown Formation consists of quartz sand deposited in a variety of nearshore environments. The sediments in the picture were deposited in a delta front. The lower Englishtown is conformable with the Woodbury Formation underneath. There is a major unconfrmity in the Englishtown that separates it into two seuqences.