Leclercqia

Leclercqia complexa

Australia, North and South America, Europe

Leclercqia is an extinct genus of flowering plants from the Devonian and is placed in the order of Protolepidodendrales, an early group of Bärlapppflanzen.

Copies of Leclercqia complexa are high to 46 cm and have a diameter of 3.5 to 7 mm. The Stems are branched dichotomously or pseudomonopodial and are staffed by 6.5 mm long Mikrophyllen. These leaves have approximately in the middle two lateral appendages, which in turn are divided and end pointed. The central part is gradually narrowed and bent back backwards. The fünfspitzigen leaves are narrow and give the plant an unusual appearance. Leclercqia has ligules.

Some finds the stele is preserved as pyritic petrification. The stele is in the cross-section is circular and has up to 18 external protoxylem points. The metaxylem consists of scalariform tracheids or have oval pits. The stele is surrounded by a narrow, parenchymatous cortex. Each sheet is supplied by a single vascular bundle, which branches off from a protoxylem strand of the stele.

The sporangia are sitting on the adaxial surface of the sporophylls. The Sporophylle are virtually indistinguishable from the sterile leaves, and are distributed over the entire shoot axis. The spores are trilet, have occupied a diameter of 60 to 85 microns and with numerous, closely seated spines with broad base. The numerous finds with only one type of spores are interpreted as an indication that Leclercqia was homospor.

Documents

• Thomas N. Taylor, Edith L. Taylor, Michael Krings: Paleobotany. The Biology and Evolution of Fossil Plants. Second Edition, Academic Press 2009, ISBN 978-0-12-373972-8, pp. 275-278.

• Extinct plant
• Bärlapppflanzen
• Lycopodiopsida