NO LARGE BIAS WITHIN SPECIES BETWEEN THE RECONSTRUCTED AREAS OF COMPLETE AND FRAGMENTED FOSSIL LEAVES

Abstract

Research Article| January 21, 2019 NO LARGE BIAS WITHIN SPECIES BETWEEN THE RECONSTRUCTED AREAS OF COMPLETE AND FRAGMENTED FOSSIL LEAVES ERIC R. HAGEN; ERIC R. HAGEN 1Wesleyan University, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Middletown, Connecticut 06459, USA Search for other works by this author on: GSW Google Scholar DANA L. ROYER; DANA L. ROYER 1Wesleyan University, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Middletown, Connecticut 06459, USA Search for other works by this author on: GSW Google Scholar RYAN A. MOYE; RYAN A. MOYE 1Wesleyan University, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Middletown, Connecticut 06459, USA Search for other works by this author on: GSW Google Scholar KIRK R. JOHNSON KIRK R. JOHNSON 2Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of Natural History, Washington, D.C. 20013, USA Search for other works by this author on: GSW Google Scholar Author and Article Information ERIC R. HAGEN 1Wesleyan University, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Middletown, Connecticut 06459, USA DANA L. ROYER 1Wesleyan University, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Middletown, Connecticut 06459, USA RYAN A. MOYE 1Wesleyan University, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Middletown, Connecticut 06459, USA KIRK R. JOHNSON 2Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of Natural History, Washington, D.C. 20013, USA email: ehagen@wesleyan.edu Publisher: SEPM Society for Sedimentary Geology First Online: 21 Jan 2019 Online Issn: 1938-5323 Print Issn: 0883-1351 Copyright © 2019, SEPM (Society for Sedimentary Geology) PALAIOS (2019) 34 (1): 43–48. https://doi.org/10.2110/palo.2018.091 Article history First Online: 21 Jan 2019 Cite View This Citation Add to Citation Manager Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Search Site Citation ERIC R. HAGEN, DANA L. ROYER, RYAN A. MOYE, KIRK R. JOHNSON; NO LARGE BIAS WITHIN SPECIES BETWEEN THE RECONSTRUCTED AREAS OF COMPLETE AND FRAGMENTED FOSSIL LEAVES. PALAIOS 2019;; 34 (1): 43–48. doi: https://doi.org/10.2110/palo.2018.091 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Refmanager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentBy SocietyPALAIOS Search Advanced Search Abstract Taphonomic processes may filter in a biased manner the tiny fraction of leaves preserved as fossils. A common perception is that large leaves are underrepresented; this is based both on intuition (large leaves are more likely to break apart) and some observations of extant vegetation. Characterizing leaf area correctly is critical for reconstructing climate and for studying evolutionary and biogeographic patterns. In extant dicotyledonous angiosperms, leaf area generally scales with the inverse of second-order vein density. This scaling offers the potential to test if fossil leaf fragments were derived from leaves that were larger than complete (or nearly complete) fossil leaves of the same species. Here we test vein scaling on 573 complete leaves from the latest Cretaceous Hell Creek Formation and earliest Paleocene Fort Union Formation in the Williston Basin of western North and South Dakota. We find a strong scaling similar to extant vegetation, with a somewhat shallower slope (1.67 vs. 2.04) and lower r2 (0.64 vs. 0.80). We apply these two scalings to 41 species-site pairs from the Williston Basin that are each represented by complete (n = 355) and fragmented (n = 387) leaves. With both scalings, the reconstructed leaf areas of fragments are on average 10% larger (±36% 1σ) than their complete companions. This small but noisy signal means that the underrepresentation of large leaves, as captured by our study design, is probably not critical for most fossil applications. Comparing directly the reconstructed areas of complete and fragmented leaves appears reasonable, thus expanding the usefulness of fossil leaf fragments. You do not have access to this content, please speak to your institutional administrator if you feel you should have access.