Athrotaxites

Athrotaxites is an extinct genus of conifers belonging to the family Cupressaceae, known primarily from fossil material dating to the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods. It is closely related to the extant Tasmanian genus Athrotaxis, and is typically classified within the subfamily Athrotaxoideae.

Athrotaxites

Ghedoghedo · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
ConiferalesPBDB
Diet
"photoautotroph"PBDB, for Streptophyta

Time the record covers

At least 41 million years on record.

The record covers at least 154.8 Mya to 113.2 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 165.3 Mya to 100.5 Mya.

Middle Jurassic — about 0 of 14 occurrencesLate Jurassic — about 6 of 14 occurrencesLate JurassicEarly Cretaceous — about 8 of 14 occurrencesEarly CretaceousLate Cretaceous — about 0 of 14 occurrences167–164 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences164–162 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences162–160 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences160–158 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences158–155 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences155–153 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences153–151 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences151–149 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences149–146 Mya — about 1 occurrence146–144 Mya — about 1 occurrence144–142 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences142–140 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences140–137 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences137–135 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences135–133 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences133–131 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences131–128 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences128–126 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences126–124 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences124–122 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences122–119 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences119–117 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences117–115 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences115–113 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences113–110 Mya — about 1 occurrence110–108 Mya — about 1 occurrence108–106 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences106–104 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences104–101 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences101–99 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences154.8 Mya113.2 Mya167 Mya99 Mya

14 occurrences of Athrotaxites on record, most of them in the Early Cretaceous. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

14 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

7 formations

Beaver Mines — 49.03°N, 114.50°WMorrison — 47.10°N, 110.10°WUslika — 56.43°N, 125.75°WCañadón Asfalto — 43.50°S, 69.10°WGangapur — 19.27°N, 79.43°ECommotion — 54.42°N, 120.37°WBeaver Mines — 49.15°N, 114.95°W

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The named rock units Athrotaxites has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 6 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Athrotaxites and its relatives

Early Cretaceous

Where Athrotaxites and its relatives were recorded in the Early Cretaceous.

Found in the same rock

88 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 13 sites for Athrotaxites, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

8 references

Each of the 14 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Athrotaxites

Credit
Ghedoghedo
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Athrotaxites was found in Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itConiferales through timeFormations of the Early CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Unger 1849