Saportanthus parvus E.M.FRIIS, P.R.CRANE et K.R.PEDERSEN, 2017

Friis, Else Marie, Crane, Peter R., Pedersen, Kaj Raunsgaard, Mendes, Mário Miguel & Kvaček, Jiří, 2022, The Early Cretaceous Mesofossil Flora Of Catefica, Portugal: Angiosperms, Fossil Imprint 78 (2), pp. 341-424 : 367-368

Saportanthus parvus E.M.FRIIS, P.R.CRANE et K.R.PEDERSEN, 2017

Text-fig. 18c, d

Description and remarks. The species was described based on well-preserved flowers from the Catefica mesofossil flora (for a full description see Friis et al. 2017). The flowers are small, actinomorphic, with six to eight broadly ovate tepals, five to seven stamens, and a unicarpellate, uniovulate, semi-inferior ovary ( Text-fig. 18c, d ). The pollen is 8–12 µm in diameter. The aperture configuration of the pollen is not securely established for the material from Catefica, but the tectum ornamentation is finely striate and forms a fingerprint-like pattern ( Friis et al. 2017: fig. 13A–C) similar to that known for the trichotomocolpate and dicolpate pollen of the two other species of Saportanthus recorded from other Early Cretaceous mesofossil floras from Portugal.

Affinity and other occurrences. A phylogenetic assessment of Saportanthus suggests that the genus is sister to, or embedded within, core Laurales ( Friis et al. 2017) . The genus is widely distributed among the Early Cretaceous mesofossil floras from Portugal. Three species are currently recognized; S. brachystemon E.M.FRIIS, P.R.CRANE et K.R.PEDERSEN , S. dolichostemon E.M.FRIIS, P.R.CRANE et K.R.PEDERSEN and S. parvus . Currently, S. parvus is known only from Catefica. “Flower sp. 2” from the Chicalhão site near Juncal is closely similar and may also belong to this species, but only one specimen is known and there are no details of internal features ( Friis et al. 2017).

Flowers of Saportanthus parvus are common in the Catefica mesofossil flora, but the characteristic, finely striate pollen grains produced by these flowers have so far not been observed in the Catefica dispersed palynoflora, probably due to their very thin and poorly preservable pollen wall.

Figures

Text-fig. 18. Scanning electron microscope (SEM) images of fragmentary flower of Catanthus dolichostemon (a, b) and flower of Saportanthus parvus (c, d); Catefica locality, Portugal. a, b) Fragment of flower bud showing bulky tepals (te) and fleshy stamens (st) in ventral (a) and lateral (b) views; note the long stamen base and small anther with extrorse anther dehiscence (arrows); c, d) Flower in lateral (c) and oblique apical (d) views showing inferior ovary and eight bulky tepals almost completely enclosing the stamens and styles. Specimens, Catefica MM92-P0159 (a, b), Catefica MM285-P0331 (c, d). Scale bars = 300 Μm (a–d).