A new occurrence of silicified wood from the Early Cretaceous (Berriasian) Kagbeni Formation of north central Nepal

Khum Paudayal; Lalu Paudel; Dieter Uhl

doi:10.54991/jop.2016.299

Authors

Khum Paudayal Tribhuvan University, Central Department of Geology, Kirtipur, Kathmandu, Nepal
Lalu Paudel Tribhuvan University, Central Department of Geology, Kirtipur, Kathmandu, Nepal
Dieter Uhl Senckenberg Forschungsinstitut und Naturmuseum, Senckenberganlage 25, 60325 Frankfurt am Main, Germany

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.54991/jop.2016.299

Keywords:

Cretaceous, Nepal, Permineralized wood, Agathoxylon nepalense

Abstract

During recent fieldwork a second occurrence of silicified wood has been discovered from the Early Cretaceous Kagbeni Formation of north central Nepal. The wood exhibits anatomical features which are well in accordance with Araucarioxylon nepalense described from another locality in the Kagbeni Formation near Kagbeni in the Thakkhola Valley in central Nepal. It is a pycnoxylic wood with mostly uniseriate and rarely biseriate bordered pits on radial tracheid walls. According to recent taxonomic opinions this type of wood should not be treated as Araucarioxylon, but as Agathoxylon Hartig. Thus, we propose the name Agathoxylon nepalense comb. nov. for this type of wood. The sandstones of the Kagbeni Formation have been interpreted as delta–deposits, with a major flow direction from the south. This suggests that the wood originated from the northern margin of Gondwana (i.e. the Indian Plate).

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