Florida cherts: Suwannee, Ocala and Tampa Bay

Florida's cherts are silicified limestone, and most of the state's Paleoindian and Early Archaic points were made from whichever outcrop lay close by. Twenty chert sources are recognised, mostly where karst springs and early sites cluster along the west side of the peninsula. The chert sits as hard packages inside limestone beds, with the Eocene Ocala and Oligocene Suwannee formations the best used, plus beds in the Tampa Bay area. Tiny fossils inside the stone, especially foraminifera, are distinctive to each formation, so specialists can often name the source. Most tools came from sources less than 30 km away; a few Bolen points travelled 200 miles or more.

Silicified limestone occurs in several Florida formations. Silicified limestone (chert) is common in the upper facies of the Upper Eocene Ocala Limestone and throughout the Lower Oligocene Suwannee Limestone, whose fossils include mollusks, foraminifers, corals and echinoids (Scott 2001). In the Tampa Bay area the Tampa Member of the Arcadia Formation holds mollusks and corals as molds, casts and silicified pseudomorphs. Some sources are tied to one formation, for example the Citronelle, St. Marks and Peace River formations, while Ocala and Suwannee chert is exposed at several places. The chert outcrops as uneroded packages in limestone beds, often standing out from the surrounding rock.