The formation is also mapped in the valley of the Dry Cimarron in northeastern New Mexico, where it forms a prominent band in the lower parts of the cliffs.

[6] The Lytle was the last (youngest) non-marine unit to form in the Denver Basin before the region was fully inundated by the Western Interior Seaway.

It was formed above sea level from sediments carried by heavily laden rivers flowing from the eroding uplifts of the Sevier orogeny several tens of millions of years before the Rocky Mountains rose.

[7][1] Detrital zircon geochronology of the Lytle Formation in the Raton Basin suggests a late Jurassic age for this unit.

[8] Known fossils are fragments of petrified wood eroded from the west as well as nondescript animal burrows, possibly Skolithos and Arenicolites.