Re: Cretaceous angiosperms

["Ken Kinman" <kinman@hotmail.com>]

    Well, there have long been claims of both body fossils (_Sanmiguelia_) 
and pollen of angiosperms from the Upper Triassic, but all the 
pre-Cretaceous stuff is still controversial.  Paleobotanists argue just as 
much as other paleontologists.
     I have no doubt that there were Jurassic angiosperms, but probably not 
very widespread (unless they had heavy pollen in small amounts that didn't 
get scattered around much).  The trouble is that they were probably 
restricted to upland habitats, and unless they had light, wind-blown pollen, 
their fossil record is going to suffer the same drawbacks as upland 
vertebrates (but worse, without the relative advantages of hard bones).
     Whether they really occurred in the Triassic remains to be seen, and 
it may well depend on how you define "angiosperm".  But I think the 
consensus is that _Sanmiguelia_ is probably a non-angiosperm which had 
leaves somewhat convergent with those of palms.  The controversy continues.
          -------  Ken Kinman
P.S.  I think we can safely say that Archaefructus is not Jurassic, but it 
may be older than 124 million years.
******************************************
David wrote:
> *Archaefructus* isn't the oldest one, even though it is pretty old at the
> usual Liáoníng age of 122 -- 124 Ma IIRC. I don't know whether it is the
> oldest "body fossil" of an angiosperm. The authors hailed it as "A Jurassic
> Flower" in the description, well, they were wrong.


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