The fossil pollen tetrad Quadripollis krempii Drugg 1967; morphology, palaeogeography and botanical affinity

ABSTRACT

Quadripollis krempii was described by Drugg 1967 from Maastrichtian deposits in California and has been reported from the Albian to Paleocene of the western United States and Canada. A revised description is supported by illustrations of specimens found in outcrops of the Straight Cliffs Formation in southern Utah. Q. krempii is unique among fossil tetrads and the tetrahedral tetrad is apparently inaperturate. We observe that the thinning and occasional rupturing of the exine observed by Drugg is a vestigial aperture, herein described as a tenuitas. Q. krempii has been thought to be either gymnospermous or angiospermous. No modern gymnosperms produce pollen in obligate tetrads but at least 23 angiosperm families do. Our review revealed possible families with some similarities to Q. krempii, mainly members of the Juncaceae which exhibit an ulcerated or thinned exine in the distal areas of the monads. A relationship to bryophytes cannot be ruled out.

KEYWORDS:

• palynology
• Quadripollis krempii
• tetrad pollen
• Cretaceous
• Utah

Acknowledgments

We thank Cari Johnson, Julia Mulhern and Cory Johnson from the University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah, for providing access to samples from the Buck Hollow section and EP-24 in the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument. Malcolm Jones, Palynological Laboratory Services, Anglesey, Wales, processed the samples, Susan Toadvine drafted Figure 1, and Mary Ellen Vedas located many of the references. David Pocknall and Marie Thomas publish with the permission and support of Hess Corporation, Houston, Texas. We thank James Doyle and Carlos Jaramillo for their many suggestions for improvement to the original manuscript, especially those related to possible affinity both fossil and modern.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

David T. Pocknall

DAVID T. POCKNALL is a consultant biostratigrapher in Houston, TX. He graduated with a degree in botany from Victoria University in Wellington, New Zealand, and a PhD degree from the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand. David joined the New Zealand Geological Survey in 1979 where he focused on Cretaceous and Tertiary palynology and published widely on the subject. During his time at the New Zealand Geological Survey, David spent 18 months on study leave at the US Geological Survey in Denver, CO, working on Paleocene coals of the Powder River Basin, WY. In 1991, he joined Amoco Production Company in Houston, which later became BP. David's main areas of study were South America (particularly Venezuela and Colombia), Trinidad and Egypt. During his time with BP, David was a team leader in Exploration and Production Technology and was also a global recruitment manager. In 2008, he returned to palynology and biostratigraphy. In August 2009, David retired from BP and joined Hess Corporation working on stratigraphic projects in Hess's global portfolio of exploration and production assets, and spent two years leading the reservoir analysis group in Hess's technology organization. In December 2016, he retired for the second time. He served as AASP Secretary-Treasurer from 1993 to 1998 and was President of AASP between 2000 and 2002, and presently chairs the association's CENEX committee.

David M. Jarzen

DAVID M. JARZEN is a research associate at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, in Paleobotany and Paleoecology, and graduate faculty member of the Anthropology Department at Kent State University, Kent, OH. He earned his BS degree in 1967 from Kent State University majoring in Biological Sciences, and two years later received his MA degree in Botany from the same institution. In 1973, working with Geoff Norris, he was awarded the PhD degree in Geology from the University of Toronto. His research interests in the nature of extant and fossil plant life have provided extensive field work in all regions of Canada and the United States, as well as Europe, Africa, Central and South America, the South Pacific and several localities within Australia. The focus of his work incorporates a global view aiming to understand the evolution of plant life during Earth's history, with an emphasis on fossil floras recorded from the Paleogene, Neogene and Cretaceous of the world. Some of his work has been seen in Scientific American, The Owl Magazine, other popular publications, on the Internet, and in museum displays in Canada, Australia and the United States. His work has been incorporated in several radio and television productions including CBC's Nature of Things with David Suzuki, the PBS NOVA Series, the NHK (Japan) Series The Miracle Planet, the National Film Board of Canada, the Discovery Channel and other North American cable networks. In 1987, he was an invited visiting scholar to the Department of Geology & Mineralogy of The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia, and in 1991 and 1994 to the Botany Department of the same university. In 2005, he was invited to Australia once again; this time to work with colleagues at the Queensland Museum in Brisbane, Queensland. In 2003, he was elected as Fellow National to the Explores Club, and in 2005, he was elected Fellow of the Ohio Academy of Science. David is listed in American Men and Women of Science, Who's Who in Ontario (Canada), Who's Who in Canadian Science, Who's Who in Science and Engineering as well as Who's Who in America and Who's Who in the World.

Marie L. Thomas

MARIE L. THOMAS is a geologist and biostratigrapher at Hess Corporation in Houston, TX. During her short time at Hess, Marie has worked many areas, including the Gulf of Mexico; the Orphan Basin, Jeanne d'Arc and Flemish Pass basins; offshore Mauritania and Senegal (MSGBC Basin); offshore Nova Scotia; and the North Malay Basin. She graduated with a PhD degree in geology from Louisiana State University, LA, in 2015. For her dissertation, she studied Quaternary palynology in the Gulf of Papua, Papua New Guinea. She completed her undergraduate degree with a double major in biology and geology at Millsaps College in Jackson, MS, in 2011, where she studied salamanders.