FOSSIL TROPICAL PLANT (SEED FERN) - 300 million years old - Villablino, Leon, Spain
« backFOSSIL TROPICAL PLANT (SEED FERN)
300 million years old
Villablino, León, Spain
Fossilised leaves of a seed fern from coal mines of the Villablino Coal Field in Spain.
| THE COAL MEASURES FORESTS In the Carboniferous period Europe was situated near the equator and covered by dense tropical rain forest with giant trees and strange fern-like plants. Much of this vegetation became layers of coal, but some plants left impressions in mud which hardened into stone. Flowering plants had not yet evolved and the dominant vegetation was giant clubmosses, horsetails and seed ferns growing on the banks of the coal-forming swamps. Animal life at the time was dominated by insects which included dragonflies with a two-metre wingspan. |
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Size: 14 x 10 x 2 centimetres
Weight: 609 grams
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