Fossil evidence for a hyperdiverse sclerophyll flora under a non-Mediterranean-type climate.

ABSTRACT: The spectacular diversity of sclerophyll plants in the Cape Floristic Region in South Africa and Australia's Southwest Floristic Region has been attributed to either explosive radiation on infertile soils under fire-prone, summer-dry climates or sustained accretion of species under inferred stable climate regimes. However, the very poor fossil record of these regions has made these ideas difficult to test. Here, we reconstruct ecological-scale plant species richness from an exceptionally well-preserved fossil flora. We show that a hyperdiverse sclerophyll flora existed under high-rainfall, summer-wet climates in the Early Pleistocene in southeastern Australia. The sclerophyll flora of this region must, therefore, have suffered subsequent extinctions to result in its current relatively low

SUBMITTER: Sniderman JM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3587219 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature