Paleogene floras from Seymour Island, Antarctic Peninsula

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Abstract
Numerous carbon films and leaf impressions have been recovered from a Paleocene locality of the Cross Valley Member of the Sobral Formation and from two horizons of the middle to late Eocene La Meseta Formation, Seymour Island, Antarctic Peninsula. These fossil megafloral assemblages are dominated by specimens of the genus Nothofagus, the Southern Beech, with representatives of araucarian and podocarp conifers and several species of ferns. The fossil material of Nothofagus exhibits a strong similarity to species of that genus from southern South America and indicates that the paleoclimate of the Antarctic Peninsula was cool temperate during the early Tertiary. The association of this plant material with fossil marsupials of the family Polydolopidae and the dependence of Nothofagus on overland seed dispersal strengthen the contention that the hypothesized Weddellian Province reconstruction of Gondwanaland during late Cretaceous and early Tertiary time was a continuous coastal, cool, temperate biogeographical province.

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