A PLEISTOCENE FLORA FROM THE ISLAND OF 



TRINIDAD 



By Edward W. Beury, 

 Of the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland 



The present contribution is based upon a considerable collection of 

 fossil plants wliich I owe to the industry and kind cooperation of 

 Dr. H. G. Kiigler and the courtesy of the Apex Oilfields, Ltd., of 

 Fyzabad, Trinidad. I am indebted for three additional specimens 

 to Prof. Gilbert D. Harris. The latter were collected by G. A. 

 Waring. The types have been presented to the United States 

 National Museum. 



Fossil leaves were reported from Trinidad in 1860 by Wall and 

 Sawkins but no collections from the Island have been studied until 

 recently. Doctor Kiigler has made large collections for me which 

 await description, and the New York Botanical Garden have also 

 made collections which have been described by Dr. Arthur Hollick, 

 whose account is now in press. All of these are from earlier beds 

 than those which form the subject of the present paper. 



This collection comes from strata known locally as the Oropouche 

 formation, and comprise sands and horizontal, more or less lignitic, 

 clays, that receive their name from outcrops near the village of 

 Oropouche in the western half of the southei^n depression of the 

 island. These sands and clays represent the erosion products of 

 the folded areas of the central and southern ranges during the 

 Pleistocene. 



The collecton is of very great interest because, although the num- 

 ber of species is limited, they give clear evidence of the presence ol 

 mangrove swamps during the Pleistocene, and the fact that several 

 of the forms cannot be positively identified with members of the 

 existing flora of that region and have had to be described as new, 

 and therefore extinct, indicates a considerable antiquity. 



The species described number 9 and represent 7 orders and 8 

 families. With the exception of a single trace of a feather palm of 



No. 2558. — Proceedings U. S. National Museum, Vol. 66, Art. 21. 



9115—25 1 1 



