Morphological Variation of Jurassic Bennettitaleans from Sri Lanka

Present study examines the morphology of Sri Lankan plant fossil of Bennettitales with the type specimens in the Natural history museum UK and details in the literature and systematically documents their diversity for assessing palaeo-environmental significance. Plant fossil-bearing mudstones of Jurassic age are present in a small faulted basin within the Precambrian basement rocks at Tabbowa, in the north western province of Sri Lanka. The present study reveals that fossils of plant species Ptilophyllum, Otozamites, Pterophyllum, Zamites, Dictyozamites of the order Bennettitales of Jurassic period are present in the Tabbowa sedimentary rocks, comparison with type-specimens of the Jurassic species confirms their unique and similar palaeo-environment prior to fragmentation of the Gondwanaland. Since there are no previous detailed morphological descriptions available for the Sri Lankan plant fossils comparing the features of type specimen, we consider that present descriptions provide specific details of Jurassic fossils of Sri Lankan Cycadophyta, facilitating work of future investigators.