Betula leopoldae
Betula leopoldae is an extinct species of birch in the family Betulaceae. The species is known from fossil leaves, catkins, and inflorescences found in the early Eocene deposits of northern Washington state, United States, and similar aged formations in British Columbia, Canada. The species is placed as basal in Betula, either as a stem group species, or an early divergent species.

Kevmin · CC BY-SA 3.0 · 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
- BetulaPBDB
- Diet
- "photoautotroph"PBDB, for Angiospermae
Time the record covers
At most 23 million years on record.
Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 56 Mya and 33.9 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.
3 occurrences of Betula leopoldae on record, most of them in the Eocene. 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
3 occurrences- Eocene100%
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
2 formations
- Klondike Mountain Formation1
- Allenby Formation · Princeton Group1
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The named rock units Betula leopoldae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 1 occurrence has no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Betula leopoldae and its relatives
EoceneWhere Betula leopoldae and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.
Found in the same rock
96 taxa- Acer3 sites
- Alnus parvifolia3 sites
- Comptonia columbiana3 sites
- Macginitiea gracilis3 sites
- Pseudolarix3 sites
- Sassafras3 sites
- Abies2 sites
- Alnus2 sites
- Amentotaxus2 sites
- Carya2 sites
- Chamaecyparis2 sites
- Cornus2 sites
- Corylus2 sites
- Cunninghamia2 sites
- Dipteronia2 sites
- Fagopsis undulata2 sites
- Fagus2 sites
- Ginkgo2 sites
- Koelreuteria2 sites
- Langeria magnifica2 sites
- Metasequoia occidentalis2 sites
- Picea2 sites
- Pinus2 sites
- Prunus2 sites
The Paleobiology Database records 3 sites for Betula leopoldae, 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
3 references- The Eocene Thomas Ranch flora, Allenby Formation, Princeton, British Columbia, Canada1
- The McAbee flora of British Columbia and its relation to the Early-Middle Eocene Okanagan Highlands flora of the Pacific Northwest1
- Middle Eocene Dicotyledonous Plants from Republic, Northeastern Washington1
Each of the 3 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. Each entry links to doi.org. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.
Media and terms
Media content2
Picture of Betula leopoldae
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Kevmin
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 3.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
3D model
- Source
- Sketchfab
- Credit
- Yale Peabody Museum
- Licence
- CC Attribution
- Commercial use
- cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
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 itBetula through timeFormations of the EoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Wolfe and Wehr 1987