XII.—The Genus Pitys, Witham, emend

Abstract

Few plants of Carboniferous age have appealed so strongly to the scientific observer as the huge woody trunks of a coniferous type that have been discovered from time to time in beds of that system. The appeal has come from different points of view at different times; thus these trees were hailed by Witham (1831, pp. 1–2), Lindley and Hutton (1831, p. xiii), and Hugh Miller (1849, p. 186) as evidence of the existence of higher coniferous plants in abundance during a period to which the current consensus of scientific opinion had assigned only members of the lower plant families, or would admit only an infrequent occurrence of higher forms. These remains were therefore important in discussions concerning the development of plant life, and were cited by Hugh Miller (1849, p. 185) in his attempt to combat the then embryonic ideas of evolution—the recrudescence of Lamarckian ideas—current under the name of “the development hypothesis.” Miller, however, recognised one significant point, namely, that they represented a land flora as distinct from one occupying a water habitat (1849, p. 202).

Biomechanical Reconstruction of the Carboniferous Seed FernLyginopteris oldhamia: Implications for Growth Form Reconstruction and Habit

“…An exceptionally long permineralized stem of the Lower Carboniferous putative seed plant Calamopitys indicated a semi-selfsupporting mode of growth (Rowe et al 1993;Rowe and Speck 1998). This differed radically from the self-supporting mode of growth identified in young ontogenetic stages of Pitus dayi (Gordon 1935;Speck and Rowe 1994;Rowe and Speck 1998). Such investigations revealed significant differences in development between a stem that remained (almost) unaltered by secondary growth (Calamopitys) and a stem showing significant changes in anatomy, organization, and biomechanics as a result of secondary growth (P. dayi).…”

Leaf phenology of some mid-Cretaceous polar forests, Alexander Island, Antarctica

“…Gordon, 1935;Galtier & Scott, 1994;Falcon-Lang & Cantrill, 2000). In addition, the technique is dependent on the ring increments in young woods representing annual periods of growth, a questionable assumption for some fossil wood assemblages (Falcon-Lang, 1999a).…”

Transitional changes in arborescent lignophytes at the Devonian–Carboniferous boundary

“…Until recently, the record of Mississippian lignophytes was almost non-existent in Gondwana before the Serpukhovian, which marks the onset of a Nothorhacopteris flora in South America (Balseiro et al 2009, and references therein) and Australia (Hill et al 1999). The arborescent lignophytes of Mississippian age from Australia were represented by logs of Viséan age assigned to the genus Pitus (Walkom 1928), a taxonomic assignation severely criticized by Gordon (1935). Early Mississippian environments were described as uniformly dominated by small to medium-sized lycophytes in this part of the world.…”

“…This problem is especially noteworthy for the Hastarian. For example, whether Archaeopitys from the New Albany Shale is congeneric with Archaeopteris, or with Pitus, or represents a distinct genus remains uncertain (Gordon 1935;Beck 1976). The status of genera such as Araucarites and Aporoxylon from Thuringia is likewise doubtful (Hörich 1915).…”