Ruffordia

Ruffordia is an extinct genus of cosmopolitan ferns that thrived during the Mesozoic and Cenozoic Eras, particularly from the Jurassic through the Cretaceous periods with the last species dying out during the Eocene. It was notable for being a widespread and abundant ground cover in open, savanna-like ecosystems, especially in regions dominated by gymnosperms and early angiosperms. Ecologically, Ruffordia was quite similar to the modern Bracken fern (Pteridium), which also forms dense, clonal colonies across open habitats. Despite this similarity, it was closer phylogenetically to Schizaeales. Three species are known, Ruffordia gopperti, Ruffordia acrodenta and Ruffordia subcretacea.

Ruffordia

Ghedoghedo · 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
SchizaeaceaePBDB
Diet
"photoautotroph"PBDB, for Streptophyta

Time the record covers

At least 106 million years on record.

The record covers at least 154.8 Mya to 48.07 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 174.7 Mya to 41.03 Mya.

Early Jurassic — about 0 of 30 occurrencesMiddle Jurassic — about 1 of 30 occurrencesMiddle JurassicLate Jurassic — about 20 of 30 occurrencesLate JurassicEarly Cretaceous — about 8 of 30 occurrencesEarly CretaceousLate Cretaceous — about 0 of 30 occurrencesPaleocene — about 0 of 30 occurrencesEocene — about 1 of 30 occurrencesEocene177–173 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences173–168 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences168–163 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences163–159 Mya — about 3 occurrences159–154 Mya — about 5 occurrences154–150 Mya — about 5 occurrences150–145 Mya — about 5 occurrences145–140 Mya — about 2 occurrences140–136 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences136–131 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences131–126 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences126–122 Mya — about 2 occurrences122–117 Mya — about 1 occurrence117–112 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences112–108 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences108–103 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences103–99 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences52–48 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences48–43 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences43–38 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences154.8 Mya48.07 Mya177 Mya38 Mya

30 occurrences of Ruffordia on record, most of them in the Late Jurassic. 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

30 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

20 formations

Mulin — 45.90°N, 133.00°EMulin — 46.60°N, 131.00°EFuxing — 42.00°N, 121.50°EFuxing — 42.30°N, 123.90°EYiming — 49.00°N, 119.50°EEifel — 50.10°N, 6.84°EAnming — 42.90°N, 125.00°EHonghuaqiao — 32.30°N, 118.30°EChijingqiao — 39.50°N, 95.00°EShiren — 41.70°N, 126.00°ENaizhishan — 43.70°N, 127.30°EWulin — 43.70°N, 127.30°ELaiyang — 37.00°N, 120.60°EShahuozi — 44.20°N, 126.00°EXiaoxi — 25.00°N, 118.10°EHuolanghuo — 45.00°N, 121.00°ECheyenne Sandstone — 37.45°N, 99.08°WHasandong — 34.94°N, 127.73°ELa Huérguina — 40.06°N, 1.88°WSainte-Barbe Clays — 50.48°N, 3.65°EPinilla de los Moros — 42.05°N, 3.24°WGuantou — 28.26°N, 119.66°E

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The named rock units Ruffordia 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.

Ruffordia and its relatives

Late Jurassic

Where Ruffordia and its relatives were recorded in the Late Jurassic.

Found in the same rock

426 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 28 sites for Ruffordia, 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

19 references

Each of the 30 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. 7 further references are not listed. 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 Ruffordia

Credit
Ghedoghedo
Licence
CC BY-SA 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Ruffordia was found in MorphoSource and Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access was 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 itSchizaeaceae through timeFormations of the Late JurassicThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Seward 1894