#cycad

Outer Wilds vines pt 5

When I design a Nomai I look up the plant they're named after and try to base their appearance on that a little. :>

Also, there may not be giraffes in OW, but the vine just didn't feel right with anything else...

Latest bloom at Missouri Botanical Gardens inside The Climatron ₍ᐢ. .ᐢ₎𖹭

Today we will talk about Petrified Wood!

One of the most common fossils, petrified wood is is tree or tree-like wood that has either been fossilized through replacement or permineralization. Usually, the organic material is replicated by silica (quartz or it's microcrystalline forms opal or chalcedony).

Petrified wood forms when woody plants are buried in saturated sediments with dissolved minerals in solution. The lack of oxygen slows decay and allows fossilization to occur.

Below are petrified wood and cycad specimens I have collected over the years from various localities I have worked at. All come from Late Jurassic sites.

The first is from the Salt Wash Member of the Morrison Formation in northwestern Colorado. It has been replaced by silica, most likely the microcrystalline quartz form, chalcedony.

The second is from the same location and has definitely been replaced by chalcedony. In this case, it looks to be the "flint" variety.

The third photo contains pieces of of wood from the Late Jurassic Swift Formation in northwest central Montana (It's a huge state. I need to be that weirdly specific). These are partially petrified and partially coalified. They still retain some of the original organic material which leaves a black residue on the fingers.

The fourth photograph are pieces that came from the Brushy Basin Member of the Morrison Formation in the San Rafael Swell of Utah. These have been permineralized by quartz.

Finally, the last two show cycads, a type of woody plant that was a prominent part of the Mesozoic woodlands and prairies. These specimens came from the same Salt Wash site as the first two tree specimens. These have also been replaced by chalcedony.

Cycas revoluta

Cycas revoluta, from southern Japan, is the most common of the cycads, and it manages to look both like a fern and like a small palm (its common name is the sago palm), but it is neither. Cycads are their own distinctive kind of plant, with their cones showing them to be relatives of the conifers. They have separate male and female plants, and the elongated cone seen here is an indication that our plant is a male.