ORIGINAL ARTICLE
New fossil records of Ceratozamia
(Zamiaceae, Cycadales) from the European
Oligocene and lower Miocene
1 | Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Science, Institute of Geology and Palaeontology, Albertov 6, CZ 12843
Praha 2, Czech Republic |
Online publication date: 2014-12-20
Publication date: 2014-12-20
Acta Palaeobotanica 2014; 54(2): 231–247
KEYWORDS
ABSTRACT
New compression leaf material of Ceratozamia (Zamiaceae) has been recognised in the European
Cenozoic. A leaflet of Ceratozamia floersheimensis (Engelhardt) Kvaček was recovered among unidentified material
from the Oligocene of Trbovlje, former Trifail, Slovenia, housed in old collections of the Austrian Geological
Survey, Vienna. It is similar in morphology and epidermal anatomy to other specimens previously studied from
the lower Oligocene of Flörsheim, Germany and Budapest, Hungary. A fragmentary leaflet assigned to C. hofmannii
Ettingsh. was recovered in the uppermost part of the Most Formation (Most Basin in North Bohemia,
Czech Republic) and dated by magnetostratigraphy and cyclostratigraphy to CHRON C5Cn.3n, that is, the latest
early Miocene. It yielded excellently preserved epidermal structures, permitting confirmation of the generic affinity
and a more precise comparison with this lower Miocene species previously known from Austria (Münzenberg,
Leoben Basin) and re-investigated earlier. Both the Oligocene and Miocene populations of Ceratozamia are based
on isolated disarticulated leaflets matching some living representatives in the size and slender form of the leaflets.
Such ceratozamias thrive today in extratropical areas near the present limits of distribution of the genus
along the Sierra Madre Orientale in north-eastern Mexico, in particular C. microstrobila Vovides & J.D. Rees
and others of the C. latifolia complex, as well as C. hildae G.P. Landry & M.C. Wilson (“bamboo cycad”). The
occurrence of Ceratozamia suggests subtropical to warm-temperate, almost frostless climate and a high amount
of precipitation. The accompanied fossil vegetation of both species corresponds well with the temperature regime.
While the Oligocene species in Hungary probably thrived under sub-humid conditions, the remaining occurrences
of fossil Ceratozamia were connected with humid evergreen to mixed-mesophytic forests.
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