Re: Cretaceous vegetation (was Trexie and whales..)

[Jeffrey Martz <martz@holly.ColoState.EDU>]

> Unfortunately, a large proportion of the pollen taxa are sufficiently
> different from any living species as to be unassignable to taxa below
> order.  Since most order contain a wide ranfge of life forms, this
> leaves the actual structure of the upland vegetation unclear.  In
> fact it is not even possible to determine which pollen morphs belong
> to the known lowland leaf fossils, so we do not even know which ones
> are upland and which lowland.

     Kirk Johnson, a paleobotanist at DMNH, did a big study of leaves in 
modern stream beds.  I can't remeber any details, but I think he figured 
out a clever way to determine which were local and which were washed down 
from farther upriver.  I THINK he applied this to Hell Creek plant 
deposits, but I'm far from certain.  Kirk is largely charge of the new 
Prehistoric Journey exhibit a DMNH, which includes a Hell Creek 
diorama.  
 
LN Jeff