Triassic fossil plant fragments from shallow marine rocks of the murihiku supergroup, new zealand

Abstract

Fossil plants have been found in two general settings within Triassic shallow marine rocks of the Murihiku Supergroup. First, very fragmentary remains were found within upward-fining beds of siltstone and sandstone. These were probably deposits of floods or storms in prodeltaic areas. Second, more complete and much rarer plant fossils have been found during intensive collecting in some of the well known shellbeds of the Murihiku Supergroup. These deposits appear to have formed at times of reduced influx of clastic material, when potential fossils, including rare plant flotsam, were concentrated in a smaller volume of sediment. © 1985 Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand.