BO'TANICAL CHARACTER. 35 



IV. BOTANICAL CHARACTER. 



The present enumeration of Raritan plants embraces between 

 1 60 and 170 species. Of this number there are from 15 to 20 

 whose botanical relations are unknown. The balance show the 

 following disposition in the great phylse of the vegetable king- 

 dom: Two Thallophytes are recorded, one a fungus and the 

 other an alga. Doubtless other representatives of this great 

 plant phylum w^ere abundant during Raritan time, and possibly 

 other species could be recorded, but they are so vague in their 

 characters as to be of little value, except in so far as they show 

 the presence of these types of plants at this remote epoch. 



The Pteridophytes, or fern-plants, are represented by 9 

 species, or .055% of the w^hole flora. In the existing flora of 

 New Jersey the percentage is .038%, but this is lowered by 

 herbaceous plants which are absent from the fossil record. Thus 

 the Raritan record shows a remarkable shrinkage as compared 

 with floras of the older Mesozoic. The species present in the 

 New Jersey beds are all wide-ranging forms of little peculiar 

 interest in this connection, and they fall in those Cretaceous 

 groups which represent the modern families, Gleicheniacese, 

 Cyatheaceae, Polypodiaceae and Ophioglossacese. The ferns 

 are more abundant in the Raritan formation than they are in 

 the Magothy formation or the Dakota group, while they are 

 considerably less abundant than in the flora of the Atane beds 

 of Greenland, where they constitute 11% of the whole flora. 



As might be expected, the great bulk of the Raritan plants 

 belong to the Spermatophyta, or seed-plants, and of these 24 are 

 referred tO' the Gymnospermse, almost twice as many as are 

 present in the recent gymnospermous flora of the State. These 

 are relatively much more abundant, both in individuals and in 

 species, than they are in the Tertiary or recent floras. Six are 

 referred to the cycads, one of which is based on a cone, one on 

 seed remains, and the balance on frond fragments. The older 

 Mesozoic abounded in cycadophytes, which at that time were 



