Phoenicites occidentalis E.W.Berry

Plant Fossil Names Registry Number: PFN000571

Act LSID: urn:lsid:plantfossilnames.org:act:571

Author: E. W. Berry

Rank: species

Reference: Berry, E. W. (1914): Fruits of a date palm in the Tertiary deposits of eastern Texas. – American Journal of Science, Ser. 4 37: 403–406.

Page of description: 403

Illustrations or figures: text-figs 1–3

Other combinations

Types

Original diagnosis/description

Fruit, as preserved in a coarse gray sandstone, an oblate spheroid about 4 cm in length by 1.5 cm in breadth. The surface is longitudinally wrinkled, due possibly to desiccation before preservation, which may also make the dimensions as given probably under what they were in life. The flesh was relatively thin compared with that of the cultivated elate and must have been of considerable consistency and fibrous rather than of the soft and almost fluid character of some of the modern varieties of the latter. The seed was relatively large—in the above mentioned specimen it is rounded at both ends, about 3 cm in length, nearly circular in transverse section and about 1 cm in diameter. A smaller specimen shows a length of about 2.5 cm and a diameter of 8 mm. The larger of these seeds shows the central hilum, the deep longitudinal sinus on the opposite side, the transverse lamellated structure exactly comparable to that of a modern date seed and the finely corrugated surface coat identical with that of a dried seed of a modern date. The smaller specimen, while not so perfect, shows the general form and sinus and the lamellated structure.

Emended diagnosis

Huegele, Manchester (2019: Int. J. Plant Sci. 180(7): 687):
Endocarp unilocular, ellipsoidal, basally and apically rounded, frequently pointed at extreme apex, smooth to faintly grooved, 22–29 mm (typically ca. 25 mm) long and 13–16 mm (typically ca. 15mm) wide, and circular to rarely elliptical in transverse section. Endocarp wall 1.3mmthick. Locule boat-shaped (fig. 4A) with rounded limbs, intruded by a longitudinally elongate dorsal infold.

Stratigraphy

Paleogene, Eocene
Whitsett Formation (according to Huegele, Manchester (2019: Int. J. Plant Sci., 180(7): 682)

Hollick (1914) stated that the material originated from "Catahoula formation, which in this region is of late Eocene or early Oligocene age". But Huegele, Manchester (2019) corrected this opinion: "Although previously suggested to derive from the Catahoula Formation, current mapping suggests that this flora was collected from the Whitsett Formation and is likely of late Eocene age".

Locality

United States
Trinity county, Texas; a cut on the International and Great Northern Railroad in southern Trinity county, where a spur to the Government Lock leaves the main line (according to Hollick 1914).