Bulletin 3. The flora of the Raritan Formation, 1911 - State of New ...

BO,TANICAL CHARACTER. 37
The sub-family Taxodieae is represented by 2. or 3 species
of gequ.oia and z of Genit_ia, all forms with a considerable
geographical range. The sub-family Supresseae makes the
greatest display in species during Raritan time, with no less
than 8 recorded forms. These include a species of Th._lja_
another of Thuyites, a wide-ranging Ju_tiperus, Morko_ga, and
2 species each in Widdringtonltes and Frenelopsis. Modern
botanists include both of the latter genera as synonyms of the
genus Callitris, but there is considerable advantage and good
arguments for maintaining their distinctness. Widdringtotfftes
Reichii (Ett.) Heer is abundant throughout the Raritan and
Magothy formations and is undoubtedly descended from the
closely allied form of the older Potomac. Widdringtonites subtills
Heer, although present in the lower Raritan at Woodbridge,
is more characteristic of the somewhat later Upper
Cretaceous deposits of the Atlantic Coastal Plain. O*_e species
of Frenelopsis is a survivor from the Lower Cretaceous, and the
other is a characteristic form in the overlying Magothy formation
in New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland. In some respects the
most interesting member of the sub-family is Moriconia cycloto.a'on.
Deb. & Ett. described originally from the European
Senonian of Aachen amI thought to be a fern. A_fterward discovered
by Heer in both the Cenomanian and Senonian beds o£
Greenland, it appears in the upper Raritan at South Amfoy.
The Angiospermae, or plants with closed ovaries, usually designated
as "flowering plants," make up the balance of the flora.
These are nearly all dicotyledons, Monocotyledons are usually
less fully represented in fossil floras than are the dicotyledons,
which not only have leaves differentiated into blade and leaf
stalk, but have these parts more resistant ;o maceration, so that
the absence of monocotyledons may simply mean that none were
preserved, although there are very plausible theoretical reasons
for reg'ardlng the mono.cotys as a comparatively moderr/offshoot
from the older dicotys. The monocotyledon known from the
Raritan formation is the single species of £ndlax to which gen_s
the writer has transferred Prof. Newberry's species of Paliurus,
and as this is a rare and not especially significant element in t_e
flora, it may be passed without further consideration.
NEW JERSEY GEOLOGICAL SURVEY