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Present day tropical plant families survived in warmer, wetter tropics 58 million years ago Jeremy Hance mongabay.com October 18, 2009 Despite large changes in the climate and geology since—including a cooling in the tropics—scientists found that many flora species dominating the landscape 58 million years ago, known as the Paleocene, still dominate today, including legumes, palms, avocado, and banana. Their discoveries could have important implications for researchers working to predict how the tropics will react to climate change. Many biologists have feared that a warmer earth will devastate rainforests assuming the flora will simply be unable to withstand hotter temperatures. This study may bring everyone back to the drawing board.
The fact that the scientists were able to examine fossils made a big difference. Researchers have had to depend on pollen analysis for information about past tropical forests, but pollen only allows identification of species to the family level, while the fossils revealed lineage all the way down to the plant's genus by examining the structure of preserved leafs. Moreover, fossils provide important information about insect types, climate, and forest structure. Studying the many and varied fossils, researchers found that the Paleocene in Colombia was warmer and wetter than today with an estimated annual temperature of 86 degrees Fahrenheit and 126 inches of rainfall, whereas the average temperature of today's Colombian rainforest is 81 degrees Fahrenheit. "It is also intriguing that while the Cerrejón rainforest shows many of the characteristics of modern equivalents, plant diversity is lower," Herrera said. Statistical analysis found that the diversity in the ancient tropical forests was 60 to 80 percent less than diversity today. Two different hypotheses have been put forward to explain this: one is that the period represents the epoch in which tropical forest diversification was just beginning; the other is that the forest ecosystem was in the midst of species-recovery after the extinction event that wiped out the dinosaurs and many others.
"Like Titanoboa, which is clearly related to living boas and anacondas, the ancient forest of northern Colombia had similar families of plants as we see today in that ecosystem. The foundations of the Neotropical rainforests were there 58 million years ago," said Florida Museum vertebrate paleontologist Jonathan Bloch, who described Titanoboa but was not part of the rainforest study. Related articles Monstrous prehistoric snake provides glimpse of warmer tropical forests (02/04/2009) On Wednesday scientists announced the discovery of the world’s largest snake, a prehistoric beast which preyed on giant turtles and crocodile-like reptiles in South America after the demise of the dinosaurs. As amazing as the discovery is, its greatest importance may be the clues it provides conservationists about the future of tropical forests under various global warming scenarios. World’s largest snake discovered: prehistoric serpent was twice the size of an anaconda 
(02/04/2009) Paleontologists have recently uncovered the world’s largest snake announces a paper in Nature. Measuring an astonishing 42 to 45 feet, the Titanoboa cerrejonensis makes the anaconda look diminutive. In fact the prehistoric serpent even makes once-ridiculous horror movie snakes appear conservative. "Truly enormous snakes really spark people's imagination, but reality has exceeded the fantasies of Hollywood," said Jonathan Bloch, one of the leaders of the party that discovered the prehistoric serpent. "The snake that tried to eat Jennifer Lopez in the movie Anaconda is not as big as the one we found."
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Tags: rainforests reptiles herps plants botany Paleontology jeremy hance tropical forests climate change impact of climate change awaymad green environment ecology Dinosaurs Evolution south america rainforest animals rainforest extinction extinction and climate change biodiversity colombia
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