Overview
Taxonomy
The Class Zosterophyllopsida is further organized into finer groupings including:
- Order (2): Sawdoniales · Zosterophyllales
- Species: ZipcodeZoo has pages for 23 species, subspecies, varieties, forms, and cultivars in the Class Zosterophyllopsida.
Orders
Sawdoniales
The Sawdoniales were among the first vascular plants in the fossil record. They are zosterophylls, descending from the same ancestors that modern lycophytes evolved from. They bore lateral, reniform sporangia, branched dichotomously, and grew at the ends by unrolling (circinate vernation). Some had smooth stems, others were covered in small spines; fungal bodies have been reported in some spines. [more]
Zosterophyllales
The Zosterophylls are a group of extinct plants. The taxon was first established by Banks in 1968 as the subdivision Zosterophyllophytina; they have since also been treated as the division Zosterophyllophyta and the class Zosterophyllopsida. They were among the first vascular plants in the fossil record, and had a world-wide distribution. They were probably stem-group lycophytes, forming a sister group to the ancestors of the living lycophytes. By the late Silurian (late Ludlovian, about 420 million years ago) a diverse assemblage of species existed, examples of which have been found fossilised in what is now Bathurst Island in Arctic Canada. [more]
At least 15 species and subspecies belong to the Order Zosterophyllales.
More info about the Order Zosterophyllales may be found here.
Sources
- The text on this page is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
- Photographs on this page are copyrighted by individual photographers, and individual copyrights apply.
- The technology underlying this page, including the controls behind Keep Exploring, is owned by the BayScience Foundation. All rights are reserved.