6.3" Pennsylvanian Fossil Flora Plate - Kentucky

Pennsylvanian Fossil Flora Plate - Kentucky #181368

This is a gorgeous fossil flora plate that contains a well preserved Annularia fossil. This plate was collected from the Breathitt Formation of Leslie County, Kentucky. It comes from the Late Carboniferous, Pennsylvanian aged forests that formed the coal shales of Kentucky and Ohio. There appears to be some Lepidodendrons and Asterophyllites on the plate as well.

It comes with an acrylic display stand.

Annularia is the form genus of leaf clusters of tree-like sphenophytes (horsetails) known as Calamites.

Leaves on Calamites trees formed in clusters of 8 or more, called whorls, at spaced nodes along stems. Annularia indicate flat, starburst-shaped whorls, but the shapes of the leaves themselves could vary from oval (A. sphenophylloides) to lanceolate or needle-like (A. radiata). They can also be identified by midline veins throughout the leaf from node to leaf tip.

We use these terms to describe the shapes of fossil imprints. Exact species are often difficult to determine, but these form taxa help to distinguish the prolific species of sphenophytes that defined the Carboniferous Period.