Abstract
Three new fossil gymnosperm woods are described from a new outcrop exposed on the margins of the Soturno River, State of Rio Grande do Sul, eastward located in relation to other well-known petrified forests from Sao Pedro do Sul and Mata, in South Brazil. The interest of their study lays on the in situ condition of the woods and its inclusion in the fluvial deposits of the Caturrita Formation, at Faxinal do Soturno County, from where such kind of fossil material were known only recently. The analysis allows to assign it to the conifers Agathoxylon africanum (Bamford) Kurzawe and Merlotti, Megaporoxylon kaokense Krausel and Chapmanoxylon sp. cf. C. jamuriense Pant and Singh. Previously known mainly from Permian localities of Gondwana (Namibia, India and South America), and with few Triassic representatives, the field relations and stratigraphic context suggest a Late Triassic age and a life around low sinuosity river systems under the influence of climatic seasonal dry conditions. Keywords: fossil woods, Agathoxylon, Megaporoxylon, Chapmanoxylon , Late Triassic, Brazil.
Highlights
The Caturrita Formation is the uppermost unit of the Rosário do Sul Group in the Mesozoic succession of the Paraná Basin, southern Brazil (Andreis et al, 1980)
Assigned to the Upper Triassic (Andreis et al, 1980; Faccini, 2000; Zerfass et al, 2003), the recent findings of large theropod footprints, evolved Spinicaudata and reproductive and vegetative remains of bennettites suggest that the upper part of the Caturrita Formation could be Early Jurassic in age (Wilberger, 2009; Silva et al, 2012; Barboni and Dutra, 2013; Rohn et al, 2014)
Usually assigned to the Upper Triassic, are rather common in the central and western areas of Rio Grande do Sul (São Pedro do Sul and Mata), both as reworked logs included in Pleistocene-Holocene sediments – and more rarely, in in situ condition (Faccini, 2000; Pires and Guerra-Sommer, 2004)
Summary
The Caturrita Formation is the uppermost unit of the Rosário do Sul Group in the Mesozoic succession of the Paraná Basin, southern Brazil (Andreis et al, 1980). In-situ Late Triassic fossil conifer woods from the fluvial channel deposits of the Soturno River (Caturrita Formation, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil)
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