Over the last 6 million years, the arid Australian Eremaean Zone (EZ) has remained as dry as it is today. A widely accepted hypothesis suggests that the flora and fauna of arid regions were more broadly distributed before aridification began. In Australia, this process started around 20 million years ago (Ma), leading to gradual speciation as the climate became increasingly arid. Here, we use genomic data to investigate the bi...

A fossil cycad pinna fragment with dichotomising and anastomosing venation and cuticular preservation from the middle Miocene Hindon Maar deposits, Otago, New Zealand, is assigned to the extinct genus Pterostoma (Cycadales: cf. Zamiaceae) as a new species: P. neehoffii . The leaf features of the Hindon Maar fossil differ from previously reported Pterostoma ‐like macrofossils and dispersed cuticles from New Zealand and Australi...

A new species of fossil fern with in situ spores, Palaeosorum waipiata (Polypodiaceae), is described and figured for a microsoroid fern frond from earliest Miocene sediments in Otago, New Zealand. The fertile frond from the Foulden Maar fossil Lagerstätte is pinnatifid with deep narrow lobes with entire margins and bears circular sori without indusia in rows on either side of the lobe midrib. Monolete spores associated with th...

Well preserved fossil wood in the form of tree stumps, logs, branches, roots and occasionally bark is common throughout the Gore Lignite Measures, southern New Zealand. The main objective of the present study is to identify the range of forest trees present using anatomical features such as: distinct growth rings; presence or absence of axial parenchyma; uniseriate to triseriate, opposite to alternate, separate or contiguous t...

Partial fossil frond impressions of a Gleichenia ‐like fern are described and figured from specimens recovered from the early Miocene Landslip Hill silcrete deposit, Gore Lignite Measures, Southland, New Zealand. The fronds are at least bipinnate, with the pinnae (β costae) bearing opposite pairs of ultimate leaflets; ultimate segments opposite to alternate, laterally directed, ovate, slightly recurved, apices rounded obtuse....