TERTIARY FOSSIL PLANTS FROM VENEZUELA. 



By Edward W. Berry, 



Of the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore. 



The collection which forms the basis for the present contribution 

 was made by C. F. Bowen during 1919, and was presented by him 

 to the United States National Museum (accession No. 63946). The 

 bulk of the material was collected from a light-colored clay inter- 

 bedded with sandstone and exposed on a small hill in the northeast- 

 ern outskirts of the town of Betijoque, District of Betijoque, State of 

 Trujillo, Venezuela. The second lot of material was collected from 

 a yellowish sandy micaceous clay exposed along the trail 2\ miles 

 northwest of La Salvadora and between 25 and 30 miles south of 

 Betijoque on the same side of Lake Maracaibo. The third lot com- 

 prises the single specimen of Entada, already described. 1 The last 

 was collected from the base of a great thickness of dark shales under- 

 lying the plant-bearing series and overlying a sandstone which has 

 an estimated thickness of from 700 to 1,000 feet, and is in turn under- 

 lain by black shales and limestones of Cretaceous (?) age, at Mesa 

 Pablo, about 5 miles southwest of Escuque, on the south side of the 

 Rio Cans. 



The beds containing these fossil plants are part of a thick series of 

 sandstones, conglomerates, and some interbedded shales which Mr. 

 Bowen informs me are similar in lithologic characters to the Lance 

 and Fort Union beds of the western United States, except that they 

 are somewhat coarser. This series is reported to be of enormous 

 thickness (10,000 to 12,000 feet), and is exposed in a narrow belt 

 bordering the Cordillera de Merida around the entire basin of Lake 

 Maracaibo. 



The beds are highly tilted in places, and were evidently deposited 

 before the last great orogenic disturbance of the region. About 2,000 

 feet below the plant horizon Mr. Bowen observed a thick bed of 

 lignite, which is perhaps of interest in comparison with the Tertiary 

 section on the Island of Trinidad. I understand that the lower third 

 of the series in Venezuela is reported to contain numerous lignite 



' Berry, E. W., Amer. Journ. Sci., vol. 50, pp. 310-313, fig. 1, 1920. 



Proceedings U. S. National Museum, Vol. 59— No. 2388. 



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