Beautifully illustrated by more than 100 photos and diagrams, this nontechnical guide surveys the geologic evolution of Mustang Island and the relationship between physical setting and biologic environments along the Texas coast. Support was provided by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration under the Texas Coastal Management Program, administered by the Texas General Land Office, and by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.

In this study, 28 cores were used to define the depositional facies, cyclicity, and sequence stratigraphy of a typical upper Guadalupian carbonate platform reservoir in the Permian Basin. Integration of facies and petrophysical data, however, demonstrates that reservoir quality is largely a function of late diagenetic overprinting of depositional facies attributes by dolomite diagenesis and anhydrite alteration and removal.