Arden Roy BashforthUniversity of Copenhagen · Natural History Museum of Denmark
Arden Roy Bashforth
Doctor of Philosophy
About
55
Publications
23,565
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1,639
Citations
Introduction
Personal webpage (links to publications): https://sites.google.com/site/ardenbashforth/
Additional affiliations
February 2015 - August 2015
Illinois State Geological Survey, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Position
- Visiting Research Scientist
January 2012 - August 2014
National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution
Position
- PostDoc Position
October 2010 - November 2011
Natural History Museum of Denmark, University of Copenhagen
Position
- Assistant Curator
Education
September 2005 - August 2010
May 1996 - November 1998
September 1991 - December 1995
Publications
Publications (55)
Serpulid remains are very rare in the Lower Jurassic Hasle Formation of Bornholm, Denmark. A historical specimen mentioned, but not figured by Malling & Grön wall (1909) was reexamined and attributed to Pentaditrupa quinquesculcata and here f igured for the first time. New finds of additional well-preserved serpulid tubes are described as Serpula?...
Four collections of Middle Pennsylvanian plant fossils create an opportunity to examine a transect from below the Colchester Coal through the roof shale of the Cardiff (Survant) Coal of the Illinois Basin. The collections come from the Colchester Coal seat earth, the Colchester Coal roof shale (two collections), and the roof shale of the Cardiff Co...
Patterns of floristic change in the Euramerican tropics during the Pennsylvanian to Permian transition have traditionally been viewed as a direct shift from a pteridophyte-dominated “Paleophytic flora” to a seed-plant-dominated “Mesophytic flora”. From this vantage point, omnipresent humidity during the Pennsylvanian “Coal Age” resulted in vast pea...
We evaluate the influences of elevation and climate on the spatio-temporal distribution of wetland and dryland biomes during the Pennsylvanian and early Permian in tropical Pangea. The longstanding ‘‘upland model” places drought-tolerant vegetation in elevated habitats, where slope and drainage created moisture-limited substrates under a humid clim...
The Late Mississippian and Pennsylvanian have been referred to as the Coal Age due to enormous paleotropical
peat accumulations (coal beds). Numerous fossil floras have been collected from these coals, and their associated
seat-earth paleosols and roof-shales, over more than two centuries, leading to the inference of vast swampy
wetlands covering t...
Premise of research. Sphenophytes are a modestly diverse lineage of vascular plants with a persistent record extending from the late Paleozoic to the present. However, patterns of arthropod herbivory on sphenophytes are poorly known because of a scattered literature, which we address in this report.
Methodology. We document the 315-million-year-lon...
We thank Davies et al. (2017) for their comments and welcome the opportunity to further discuss the role of early land plants in fluvial environments. Critically, Davies et al. (2017) note that although testable hypotheses exist for the possible role of early land plants they remain untested, and thus there is correlation (between an increase in me...
A macrofloral assemblage dominated by elements of the Euramerican dryland biome is described from the Brazil Formation in Clay County, Indiana (Illinois Basin). Fossils were recovered from a thin heterolithic unit between a shallow-marine bed and the paleosol beneath the Minshall Coal, a Middle Pennsylvanian succession deposited near the Atokan-Des...
Six late Atokan (early Asturian) floras from seasonally dry environments are described and quantitatively analyzed from adpressions and palynomorphs. Collections are from the eastern margin of the Illinois Basin, USA, in an 80 km N-S transect. Plant fossils occur in sedimentary rocks below the underclay (paleosol) of the Minshall-Buffaloville Coal...
Taxonomic analysis is provided for a Middle Pennsylvanian macrofloral assemblage collected from clastic wetland deposits in Clay County, Indiana, on the eastern margin of the Illinois Basin. Adpressed plant fossils were recovered from four distinct beds in the lowermost Staunton Formation, positioned above the Minshall Coal (uppermost Brazil Format...
We report Skolithos, Scoyenia and Mermia Ichnofacies from sub-humid tropical fluvial megafan deposits in the
Lower Pennsylvanian Tynemouth Creek Formation of New Brunswick, Canada, and discuss their evolutionary
and palaeoecological implications, especially regarding the colonization of continental freshwater/terrestrial environments. The Skolithos...
We document the occurrence of a marine bed, and its associated biota, in the Lower Pennsylvanian (Langsettian) Tynemouth Creek Formation of New Brunswick, and discuss its implications for paleogeography, stratigraphy and paleoecology. This is only the second marine interval found in the entire Pennsylvanian fill of the Maritimes Basin of Canada, th...
We document the occurrence of a marine bed, and its associated biota, in the Lower Pennsylvanian (Langsettian) Tynemouth Creek Formation of New Brunswick, and discuss its implications for paleogeography, stratigraphy, and paleoecology. This is only the second marine interval found in the entire Pennsylvanian fill of the Maritimes Basin of Canada, t...
A taxonomic, quantitative, and biostratigraphic analysis is presented for a macrofloral assemblage collected from below the Rock Island (No. 1) Coal Member at the historical Friendship Farm locality in Rock Island County, on the northwestern margin of the Illinois Basin. The Middle Pennsylvanian (middle Moscovian) fossiliferous strata involve the m...
Riparian vegetation profoundly influences modern fluvial channels in a variety of ways, depending on the life-history strategies of different plant types, disturbance frequency, and drainage conditions of available habitats. Direct evidence for these dynamic relationships is usually cryptic in ancient deposits. We report evidence for interactions b...
The 1125-m-thick type section of the Pennsylvanian Boss Point Formation is well exposed along the shore of the Bay of Fundy in Nova Scotia. We provide the first comprehensive account of the entirety of this formation, which comprises nearly one-third of the stratigraphic thickness of the Joggins Fossil Cliffs UNESCO World Heritage Site. The basal C...
As vegetation evolved during the Palaeozoic Era, terrestrial landscapes were substantially transformed, especially during the ~120 million year interval from the Devonian through the Carboniferous. Early Palaeozoic river systems were of sheet-braided style – broad, shallow, sandbed rivers with non-cohesive and readily eroded banks. Under the influe...
Vegetation is a major driver of fluvial dynamics in modern rivers, but few facies models incorporate its influence. This article partially fills that gap by documenting the stratigraphy, architecture and palaeobotany of the Lower Pennsylvanian Boss Point Formation of Atlantic Canada, which contains some of the Earth’s earliest accumulations of larg...
The distribution and community ecology of Early Pennsylvanian (middle Bashkirian, Langsettian) vegetation on a seasonally dry fluvial megafan is reconstructed from plant assemblages in the Tynemouth Creek Formation of New Brunswick, Canada. The principal motif of the redbed-dominated succession consists of degraded interfluve surfaces overlain by c...
The flora of the Kinney Brick Pit, Missourian age, central New Mexico, is revised. Total species diversity, estimated conservatively, is about 30. The flora is dominated by conifers and pteridosperms, and shows a preservational bias in favor of robust remains. Its varied composition reflects the various different habitats in the vicinity of the lag...
Using a combination of species richness, polycohort and constrained cluster analyses, the plant biodiversity of Pennsylvanian (late Carboniferous) tropicalwetlands (“coal swamps”) has been investigated in five areas in Western Europe and eastern North America: South Wales, Pennines, Ruhr, Saarland and Sydney coal basins. In all cases, species richn...
Little evokes a sense of wonder about the past like moments frozen in time: the contorted bodies of Pompeii's horrified citizens fixed in their final poses, the footprints of an ancient hominin family cemented on an African savanna, the tracks of a Jurassic predator closing in on unsuspecting prey along a muddy riverbank, or tree stumps from an anc...
The Kinney Brick Quarry is a world famous Late Pennsylvanian fossil Lagerstätte in central New Mexico, USA. The age assigned to the Kinney Brick Quarry (early-middle Virgilian) has long been based more on its inferred lithostratigraphic position than on biostratigraphic indicators at the quarry. We have developed three datasets —-stratigraphic posi...
We reconstruct the spatial heterogeneity and community ecology of riparian vegetation preserved in fluvial deposits of the upper Asturian to middle(?) Cantabrian (upper Moscovian) Nýřany Member, Central and Western Bohemian Basin, Czech Republic. Poorly fossiliferous channel sandstone and conglomerate dominate at the four localities studied, but fi...
Newly discovered tetrapod trackways are reported from eight sites in the Lower Pennsylvanian Tynemouth Creek Formation of southern New Brunswick, Canada. By far the most abundant and well-preserved tracks comprise pentadactyl footprints of medium size (32–53 mm long) with slender digits and a narrow splay (mostly < 55°). Digit lengths typically app...
Most paleobotanical studies involving Pennsylvanian vegetation have focused on communities that inhabited mires and associated clastic substrates in poorly drained basinal lowlands. In contrast, this thesis provides a paleoecological evaluation of riparian floras on basin margins and inland settings. Such landscapes were characterized by steep grad...
Accumulations of logs and flood sediment frequently block modern channels and may trigger avulsion, but these effects are difficult to demonstrate for the ancient record. Braided-fluvial channels in the Pennsylvanian South Bar Formation of Atlantic Canada contain sandstone successions up to 6 m thick of sigmoidal cross-beds, plane beds, and antidun...
Fossil wood specimens from the late Early–early Middle Jurassic of Jameson Land, Eastern Greenland, have several unexpected
features: tracheids of irregular size and shape, thinly pitted ray cell walls, heterogeneous rays, partially scalariform radial
pitting, both areolate and simple pits, and pitted elements associated with rays. These characters...
The spatial heterogeneity and community ecology is reconstructed for Late Pennsylvanian (Stephanian B sensu lato) vegetation preserved in La Magdalena Coalfield, northwestern Spain. The ≈ 1500 m thick basin-fill accumulated rapidly along the margin of the Variscan Mountains, and the principal sedimentary facies comprise the deposits of large braide...
The precursory mire of the Middle Pennsylvanian (Bolsovian) Lower Radnice Coal was buried in situ by volcanic ash, preserving the taxonomic composition, spatial distribution, vertical stratification, and synecology of this peat-forming ecosystem in extraordinary detail. Plant fossil remains represent the pre-eruption vegetation of the swamp, which...
Recovery of a large, articulate portion of Sphenophyllum costae Sterzel from lower Cantabrian strata of the Sydney Coalfield, Nova Scotia, Canada, demonstrates that it is the largest sphenophyll yet known to inhabit clastic substrates of Euramerica. The specimen shows four orders of branching, with each axis characterized by whorls of leaves having...
We describe the morphology and anatomy of large cordaitalean trees, preserved in Pennsylvanian (Bolsovian) alluvial deposits in southwest Newfoundland. Remains include more than one hundred calcite-permineralized stumps, trunks, and branches, including the largest cordaitalean trunk ever discovered, as well as common adpressed leaves. Reproductive...
A well preserved macrofloral assemblage characterized by taxonomically diverse adpressions and large cordaitean tree petrifactions was recovered from the coal-bearing Upper Carboniferous Barachois Group in Bay St. George Basin, southwestern Newfoundland. The collection is dominated by cordaitean and marattialean tree fern foliage, although medullos...
More than 100 m of nearly flat-lying, fluvially derived, thick-bedded and lensoid, clast-supported conglomerate and sandstone are found on Red Island, off the coast of the Port au Port Peninsula, western Newfoundland. Formally described herein and named Red Island Road Formation, the strata represent a unique lithologic formation not exposed or kno...
The precise timing of when upland terrains first became forested is highly controversial.
Pennsylvanian palynoflora and megaflora transported into marine highstand deposits imply
that emergent topographic highs may have supported cordaitalean forests. The discovery
of a new Pennsylvanian (Bolsovian) plant assemblage in southwest Newfoundland
confir...
Well-preserved cuticles were isolated from Cordaites principalis�Germar.Geinitz leaf compressions, i.e., foliage from extinct gymnosperm trees Coniferophyta: Order Cordaitales. The specimens were collected from the Sydney, Stellarton and Bay St. George subbasins of the once extensive Carboniferous Maritimes Basin of Atlantic Canada. Fourier transfo...
Fossil cuticles were extracted from leaves attributed to Cordaites principalis (Germar) Geinitz (Cordaitales) that were collected from Upper Carboniferous strata in Nova Scotia (Sydney and Stellarton sub-basins) and in Newfoundland (Bay St. George sub-basin). The quality of the cuticular preservation is directly related to the thermal maturity and...
A diverse, well preserved macrofloral assemblage (herein termed the Blanche Brook Assemblage), which is characterized by large tree petrifactions of cordaitean affinity and an array of adpressed foliage that includes lycopsids, sphenopsids, ferns, pteridosperms and cordaiteans, has been recovered from coal-bearing strata of the Upper Carboniferous...
Measurements of fusellar heights along the metasiculae of several Arenig graptolite species demonstrate considerable variation both between and within taxa. In many cases, heights increased rapidly during initial growth; the rate of increase decreased towards the midpoint of the metasicula then remained constant throughout the remainder of the meta...
Questions
Questions (5)
Dear Paleo Community:
Many paleontologists (and biologists) use sublimated ammonium chloride to whiten/dust specimens prior to photography. However, does anyone know of a company that makes a ready-made, purchasable apparatus (especially the pump and glass tube) for this purpose? Virtually every paleontologist I've witnessed using this apparatus has made it themselves. Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks, Arden
I am looking through the published literature for a map of Europe that shows the distribution of late Paleozoic basins. Most of these will be coal-bearing, to some degree. I know of several excellent examples that show these basins at various time slices (i.e., paleogeographic reconstructions). However, I want a map that shows the CURRENT distribution of the basins; the map should also show the existing European country borders. (I am being picky, I know!). I attach here an example from the USA (left hand side), which shows the type of map that I am looking for. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Arden
I have not found this available anywhere online, including the Geologica Balcanica website. Anyone?
Tenchov, Y. G. (1976). Composition peculiarities of the Carboniferous flora
of the Svoge Basin, West Bulgaria. Geologica Balcanica, 6, 3–11.
I HAVE NOW RECEIVED A PDF FROM CHRIS CLEAL. THANKS TO EVERYONE WHO ANSWERED!
Anyone have the volumes from the Moscow ICC congress in 1975. I do not know what volume, pagination, or even the exact year! of Richard Leary's publication, but this is the citation information I have:
Leary, 1979??. Namurian paleogeography of the western margin of the Eastern Interior (Illinois) Basin. Compte Rendu 8th International Congress on Stratigraphy and Geology of the Carboniferous, Moscow, 1975. Seems to be on around page 49 or so, and may or may not have associated plates/figures.
I am working on reconstructing the vegetation dynamics of a Middle Pennsylvanian dryland environment. I need to find an existing reconstruction of the plant that bore Taeniopteris leaves -- it need not be wholly 'accurate', but a good estimate would be nice.
