Revision of Frenguelli's (1941) Patagonian Angiosperm fossil leaf collection with comments on the original localities (Eocene?Miocene)

CAVIGLIA, N.; PUJANA, ROBERTO ROMÁN

AMEGHINIANA

ASOCIACION PALEONTOLOGICA ARGENTINA

Lugar: Buenos Aires; Año: 2020 vol. 57 p. 389 - 418

0002-7014

Frenguelli (1941) described a fossil leaf assemblage of 36 taxonomic units (9 gymnosperms and 27 angiosperms) collected from ten localities in southwestern Patagonia. Frenguelli?s article has two limitations according to present day standards: 1) most of the material was neither described nor illustrated; 2) the fossiliferous localities were not associated to any formal stratigraphic unit. A revision of the fossiliferous outcrops and of the descriptions and systematics of the angiosperm taxa of this collection was made. The original fossiliferous localities were explored and included into three formal stratigraphic units: Río Turbio, Río Guillermo and Río Leona formations. We recognized 27 taxa: 7 were assigned to known fossil-species, 18 were kept in open nomenclature and the other two were synonymized to another genus. In addition, new paleofloristic information of each unit was reported: in the Río Turbio Formation the first record of the Salicaceae (Thouinia philippii?) was recorded; in the Río Guillermo Formation it was reported the first record of the Grossulariaceae, Lauraceae and Salicaceae; and in the Río Leona Formation Nothofagus variabilis and Escalloniiyphyllum sp. were described for the first time.