Hostname: page-component-77c89778f8-9q27g Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-17T17:57:10.890Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

An unusual Middle Permian flora from the Blaine Formation (Pease River Group: Leonardian-Guadalupian Series) of King County, West Texas

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 May 2016

William A. DiMichele ,
Robert W. Hook ,
W. John Nelson  and
Dan S. Chaney
William A. DiMichele
Affiliation:
1Department of Paleobiology, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. 20560, ,
Robert W. Hook
Affiliation:
2Texas Memorial Museum, Vertebrate Paleontology Lab, The University of Texas at Austin 78712,
W. John Nelson
Affiliation:
3Illinois State Geological Survey, Champaign 61820,
Dan S. Chaney
Affiliation:
1Department of Paleobiology, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. 20560, ,
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

A new Middle Permian plant assemblage from South Ash Pasture in King County, Texas, may be the youngest and is certainly the most unusual flora known from the Permian of either West Texas or adjoining north-central Texas. Found serendipitously in the evaporite-rich upper Blaine Formation (Pease River Group, Guadalupian Series), the flora is of very low diversity despite intensive collecting efforts, and the affinities of nearly all taxa are enigmatic. The most common elements are parallel-veined leaves that resemble cordaites but that could be isolated pinnules of a pinnate leaf. Gigantopterid foliage is present but not assignable to any known taxon. A single foliar conifer specimen is too incomplete for assignment. Numerous reproductive organs, however, and an abundance of axes may represent conifers. Conchostracans, palaeoniscoid fish scales, and small heteropolar coprolites also occur in the deposit, which originated as a small, claystone-dominated channel fill in a coastal plain setting.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Paleontology , Volume 78 , Issue 4 , July 2004 , pp. 765 - 782
Copyright
Copyright © The Paleontological Society 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abilene Geological Society. 1949. Cross Section, Stonewall Co. to Hood Co., Texas. One sheet.Google Scholar
Abilene Geological Society. 1953. Cross Section, Schleicher Co. to Childress Co., Texas. One sheet.Google Scholar
Beck, C. B. 1981. Archaeopteris and its role in vascular plant evolution, v. 1, p. 193–230. In Niklas, K. J. (ed.), Paleobotany, Paleoecology, and Evolution. Praeger Scientific Publishers, New York.Google Scholar
Böse, E. 1919. The Permo-Carboniferous ammonoids of the Glass Mountains, West Texas, and their stratigraphical significance. University of Texas Bulletin, 1762:1–241.Google Scholar
Broutin, J., Doubinger, J., Farjanel, G., Freytet, F., Kerp, H., Langiaux, J., Lebreton, M. L., Sebban, S., and Satta, S. 1990. Le renouvellement des flores au passage Carbonifère Permien: approaches stratigraphique, biologique, sédimentologique. Académie des Sciences Paris, Comptes Rendues, 311:1563–1569.Google Scholar
Burnham, R. J. 1989. Relationships between standing vegetation and leaf litter in a paratropical forest: implications for paleobotany. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology, 58:5–32.Google Scholar
Clement-Westerhof, J. A. 1987. Aspects of Permian palaeobotany and palynology, 7: The Majonicaceae, a new family of Late Permian conifers. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology, 41:51–166.Google Scholar
Clement-Westerhof, J. A. 1988. Morphology and phylogeny of Paleozoic conifers, p. 298–337. In Beck, C. B. (ed.), Origin and Evolution of Gymnosperms. Columbia University Press, New York.Google Scholar
Clifton, R. L. 1942. Invertebrate faunas from the Blaine and Dog Creek Formations of the Permian Leonard Series. Journal of Paleontology, 16:685–699.Google Scholar
Clifton, R. L. 1945. Permian Word Formation: its faunal and stratigraphic correlatives. American Association of Petroleum Geologists Bulletin, 29:1766–1776.Google Scholar
Clifton, R. L. 1946. Middle Permian Cephalopoda from Texas and New Mexico. Journal of Paleontology, 20:556–559.Google Scholar
diMichele, W. A., and Aronson, R. B. 1992. The Pennsylvanian-Permian vegetational transition: a terrestrial analogue to the onshore-offshore hypothesis. Evolution, 46:807–824.Google Scholar
diMichele, W. A., and Hook, R. W. 1992. Paleozoic terrestrial ecosystems, p. 204–325. In Behrensmeyer, A. K., Damuth, J. D., DiMichele, W. A., Potts, R., Sues, H.-D., and Wing, S. L. (eds.), Terrestrial Ecosystems Through Time. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.Google Scholar
diMichele, W. A., Chaney, D. S., Dixon, W. H., Nelson, W. J., and Hook, R. W. 2000. An Early Permian coastal flora from the Central Basin Platform of Gaines County, West Texas. Palaios, 15:524–534.Google Scholar
diMichele, W. A., Mamay, S. H., Chaney, D. S., Hook, R. W., and Nelson, W. J. 2001. An Early Permian flora with Late Permian and Mesozoic affinities from North-Central Texas. Journal of Paleontology, 75:449–460.Google Scholar
Eifler, G. K., Frye, J. C., Leonard, A. B., Hentz, T. F., and Barnes, V. E. 1992. Geologic Atlas of Texas, Plainview Sheet (revised). The University of Texas at Austin, Bureau of Economic Geology, scale 1:250,000.Google Scholar
Eifler, G. K., Frye, J. C., Leonard, A. B., Hentz, T. F., and Barnes, V. E. 1993. Geologic Atlas of Texas, Lubbock Sheet (revised). The University of Texas at Austin, Bureau of Economic Geology, scale 1:250,000.Google Scholar
Ewing, T. E. 1991. The tectonic framework of Texas. Text to accompany “The Tectonic Map of Texas,” The University of Texas at Austin, Bureau of Economic Geology, 36 p.Google Scholar
Fay, R. O. 1964. Blaine Formation of northwestern Oklahoma. Oklahoma Geological Survey Bulletin, 98, 238 p.Google Scholar
Feistmantel, O. 1879. Bermrkungen über die Gattung Nöggerathia Stbg., sowie die neuen Gattungen Nöggerathiopsis Fstm. und Rhiptozamites Schmalh. Sitzungsberichte der Königl Böhmischen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften (Prague), 1879:444–454.Google Scholar
Florin, R. 1927. Preliminary descriptions of some Paleozoic genera of Coniferae. Arkiv Botanik, 21A:1–7.Google Scholar
Gao, Z., and Thomas, B. A. 1987. A re-evaluation of the plants Tingia and Tingiostrobus from the Permian of Taiyuan, China. Palaeontology, 30:815–828.Google Scholar
Glenister, B. F., Boyd, D. W., Furnish, W. M., Grant, R. E., Harris, M. T., Kozur, H., Lambert, L. L., Nassichuk, W. W., Newell, N. D., Pray, L. C., Spinosa, C., Wardlaw, B. R., Wilde, G. L., and Yancey, T. E. 1992. The Guadalupian: proposed international standard for a Middle Permian Series. International Geology Review, 34:857–888.Google Scholar
Göppert, H. R. 1864. Die fossile Flora der Permischen Formation. Paleontographica, 12, 244 p.Google Scholar
Halle, T. G. 1925. Tingia, a new genus of fossil plants from the Permian of China. China Geological Survey Bulletin, 7:1–12.Google Scholar
Halle, T. G. 1927. Paleozoic plants from Central Shansi. Paleontologica Sinica, 2:1–316.Google Scholar
Hotton, N. III, Feldmann, R. M., Hook, R. W., and DiMichele, W. A. 2002. Crustacean-bearing continental deposits in the Petrolia Formation (Leonardian Series, Lower Permian) of North-Central Texas. Journal of Paleontology, 76:486–494.Google Scholar
Hovorka, S. D., and Granger, P. A. 1986. Uubsurface to surface correlation of Permian evaporates: San Andres—Blaine—Flowerpot relationships, Texas Panhandle. Midcontinent SEPM Special Paper, 1:137–159.Google Scholar
Kerp, H., and Fichter, J. 1985. Die Makrofloren des saarpfälzischen Rotliegenden (?Ober-Karbon—Unter-Perm; SW-Deutschland). Mainzer geowissenschaftliche Mitteilungen, 14:159–286.Google Scholar
King, P. B. 1942. Permian of West Texas and southeastern New Mexico. American Association of Petroleum Geologists Bulletin, 26:535–763.Google Scholar
Koidzumi, G. 1936. Gigantopteris flora. Acta Phytotaxonomica et Geobotanica, 5:130–144.Google Scholar
Leary, R. L. 1980. Lacoea with sporangia and Calamospora spores from Rock Island, Illinois. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology, 29:23–28.Google Scholar
Leary, R. L., and Pfefferkorn, H. W. 1977. An Early Pennsylvanian flora with Megalopteris and Noeggerathiales from west-central Illinois. Illinois State Geological Survey Circular, 500:1–77.Google Scholar
Li, H., and Taylor, D. W. 1998. Aculeovinea yungiensis gen. et sp. nov. (Gigantopteridales), a new taxon of gigantopterid stem from the Upper Permian of Guizhou Province, China. International Journal of Plant Sciences, 159:1023–1033.Google Scholar
Li, H., and Taylor, D. W. 1999. Vessel-bearing stems of Vasovinea tianii gen. et sp. nov. (Gigantopteridales) from the Upper Permian of Guizhou Province, China. American Journal of Botany, 86:1563–1575.Google Scholar
Li, H., Tian, B., Taylor, E. L., and Taylor, T. N. 1994. Foliar anatomy of Gigantonoclea guizhouensis (Gigantopteridales) from the Upper Permian of Guizhou Province, China. American Journal of Botany, 81:678–689.Google Scholar
Mamay, S. H. 1954. A Permian Discinites cone. Journal of the Washington Academy of Sciences, 44:7–11.Google Scholar
Mamay, S. H. 1968. Russellites, new genus, a problematic plant from the Lower Permian of Texas. United States Geological Survey Professional Paper, 593-I:II–I15.Google Scholar
Mamay, S. H. 1989. Evolsonia, a new genus of Gigantopteridaceae from the Lower Permian Vale Formation, North-Central Texas. American Journal of Botany, 76:1299–1311.Google Scholar
Mamay, S. H., Miller, J. M., Rohr, D. M., and Stein, W. E. Jr. 1988. Foliar morphology and anatomy of the gigantopterid plant Delnortea abbottiae, from the Lower Permian of West Texas. American Journal of Botany, 75:1409–1433.Google Scholar
Meyen, S. V. 1982. The Carboniferous and Permian floras of Angaraland (a synthesis). Biological Memoirs, 7:1–110.Google Scholar
Miller, A. K., and Furnish, W. M. 1940. Permian ammonoids of the Guadalupe Mountains regions and adjacent areas. Geological Society of America Special Paper, 26, 242 p.Google Scholar
Newell, N. D. 1940. Invertebrate fauna of the Late Permian Whitehorse Sandstone. Geological Society of America Bulletin, 51:261–336.Google Scholar
Plummer, F. B., and Scott, G. 1937. Upper Paleozoic ammonites in Texas. The University of Texas Bulletin, 3701, 516 p.Google Scholar
Rees, P. M., Ziegler, A. M., Gibbs, M. T., Kutzbach, J. E., Behling, P. J., and Rowley, D. B. 2002. Permian phytogeographic patterns and climate data/model comparisons. Journal of Geology, 110:1–31.Google Scholar
Roth, R. 1945. Permian Pease River Group of Texas. Geological Society of America Bulletin, 56:893–908.Google Scholar
Salisbury, E. J. 1927. On the causes and ecological significance of stomatal frequency, with special reference to the woodland flora. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, series B, 216:1–65.Google Scholar
Scheming, M. H., and Pfefferkorn, H. W. 1984. The taphonomy of land plants in the Orinoco Delta: a model for the incorporation of plant parts in clastic sediments of Late Carboniferous age of Euramerica. Review Palaeobotany and Palynology, 41:205–240.Google Scholar
Simunek, Z. 2000. Cuticles of Cordaites from the Westphalian, Stephanian and Autunian of the Bohemian Massif (Czech Republic). Acta Palaeobotanica, 40:25–34.Google Scholar
Skinner, J. W. 1946. Correlation of Permian of West Texas and southeast New Mexico. American Association of Petroleum Geologists Bulletin, 30:1857–1974.Google Scholar
Smith, J. P. 1903. Carboniferous ammonoids of America. United States Geological Survey Monograph, 42, 211 p.Google Scholar
Taylor, T. N., and Taylor, E. L. 1993. The Biology and Evolution of Fossil Plants. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 982 p.Google Scholar
Tharalson, D. B. 1984. Revision of the Permian ammonoid family Perrinitidae. Journal of Paleontology, 58:804–833.Google Scholar
Wang, J., and Shen, G. 2000. A new species of Discinites (Noeggerathiales) from the Upper Permian of Weibei Coalfield, North China. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology, 110:175–190.Google Scholar
Zeiller, R. 1894. Notes sur le flore des couches permiennes de Trienbach (Alsace). Bulletín Société Géologique de la France, 3 ser., T 22:163–182.Google Scholar
Ziegler, A. M. 1990. Phytogeographic patterns and continental configurations during the Permian Period. Geological Society of London Memoir, 12:363–379.Google Scholar