Sprecher
Beschreibung
In the 1840s, H. Goeppert described the first Triassic flora from the Kluczbork area (Biadacz, Dobieracice, Gosław, Maciejów) in present-day Poland, although he initially interpreted its age as Jurassic. Additional specimens were later collected by F. Roemer, who assigned the flora to the Late Triassic (Rhaetian). The flora consists mainly of horsetails, seed ferns, and bennettitaleans, with ferns, cycads, and conifers also represented. The specimens described by Goeppert are still housed in the Henryk Teisseyre Geological Museum of the University of Wrocław, enabling their revision.
Preliminary analysis revealed that not all illustrated specimens have survived, whereas some taxa are represented by more material than indicated in the original publications. Only one species, Lepidopteris ottonis, had previously been revised by M. Barbacka. This species is an important Rhaetian index taxon originally described by Goeppert from Silesia. Another important species is Neocalamites lehmannianus, one of the most common horsetails of the Late Triassic and Early Jurassic of Europe. The type material of this species has not previously been revised. Additional specimens beyond the two illustrated by Goeppert were identified and show considerable variation in shoot thickness. Goeppert’s material corresponds well with the modern concept of the species despite its confusing nomenclatural history. Bennettitaleans, represented by several species of Pterophyllum, lack preserved cuticles, making their revision difficult. Locating the original fossil localities could allow palynological verification of the flora’s age, which is important given the controversy surrounding Rhaetian sediments in Silesia.
This research was funded by the National Science Centre, grant no. 2021/43/B/ST10/00941.