Sigillaria Tree Fossil a.jpg

Sigillaria Tree Fossil

SITE LOCATION: Eastern Kentucky
TIME PERIOD: Carboniferous, Pennsylvanian Period (307-331 Million Yeas Ago)
Sigillaria is a genus of extinct, spore-bearing, arborescent (tree-like) plants. It was a lycopodiophyte, and is related to the lycopsids, or club-mosses, but even more closely to quillworts, as was its associate Lepidodendron. This genus is known in the fossil records from the Late Carboniferous period but dwindled to extinction in the early Permian period (age range: from 383.7 to 254.0 million years ago). Fossils are found in United States, Canada, China, Korea, Tanzania and Zimbabwe.
Kingdom: Plantae
Phylum: Lycopodiophyta
Class: Isoetopsida
Order: †Lepidodendrales
Family: †Sigillariaceae
Genus: †Sigillaria