MESOZOIC FLORAS FROM THE NORTHERN ANTARCTIC PENINSULA

The ''classic'' Mesozoic leaf flora from Hope Bay and a previously-undescribed one from nearby Botany Bay are the most diverse known of this age from the northern Antarctic Peninsula region. New work has shown that the floras are most probably Lower Jurassic and that most of the plants were buried in floodplain sediments, with occasional crevasse splay deposition. Previous interpretations of Mesozoic palaeogeography and volcanic arc evolution in the region had utilized an Early Cretaceous age for these floras. The revised age indicates that volcanic arc uplift occurred and an integral landmass existed in this area from Early Jurassic times onwards, rather than from the Early Cretaceous.