This is Mazon Monday post #225. What's your favorite Mazon Creek fossil? Tell us at email:[email protected].
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Lepidostrobus foliaceus is one of the rarer forms of Lepidostrobus, which is the cone structure from a lepidodendron tree.
Principle parts of a lepidodendron tree from George's Basement.
Lesquereux in 1864
L. foliaceus was named by Leo Lesquereux in 1870. Lesquereux (1806-1889) was a Swiss-born bryologist and a pioneer of American paleobotany. He is credited with with naming the Mazon Creek fossil deposit in his 1870 report "Report on the Fossil Plants of Illinois", where he referred to the Mazon River as Mazon Creek.
"At Mazon Creek, the meanders of the stream have dug a broad bed through the bank of shale, and the water, washing for centuries, has uncovered great numbers of concretions and scattered them for miles from their point of origin.”
L. foliaceus can be found on page 27 of Jack Wittry's "A Comprehensive Guide to the Fossil Flora of Mazon Creek".
Lepidostrobus foliaceus Lesquereux, 1870
1870. Lepidophyllum foliaceum Lesquereux: p. 444, pl. 31, fig. 10
1879-80. Lepidostrobus foliaceus Lesquereux: p. 445 pl. 69, fig. 8
1958. Sporangites; Langford: p. 307, fig. 578 (re-figured here as Fig. 1)
1963. Lepidophyllum foliaceum Lesquereux; Langford: p. 161, figs. 731-735, (fig. 732 re-figured here as Fig. 2); figs. 734 and 735 are inverted images of the same specimen and are re-figured here as Fig. 3DESCRIPTION: These sporangia are obovate, rounded at the apex, truncate at the base, and attached to the center axis by a thick pedicel. Along each side is a thick, flattened, and undulating lamina. The inflated center shaft of the sporangium is narrowly rhomboidal.
REMARKS: Lepidostrobus foliaceus is very rare. Most examples are of detached sporangia. The specimen figured here as Fig. 1 is the most complete example known. It represents a cone-like structure from some unknown type of plant. Until spore studies are attempted, the unusual overall structure makes referring to this form as Lepidostrobus problematic.
Specimens
From Wittry
From George Langford's "The Wilmington Coal Fauna and Additions to the Wilmington Coal Flora from a Pennsylvanian Deposit in Will County, Illinois", as Lepidophyllum foliaceum, on page 161.
ESCONI member specimen (Pit 3)
