Fossil ferns and horsetails
I’m astonished every time I see detail in fossils. Their age, the heat and the pressure they have been subjected to, and the often random nature of their discovery make it extraordinary that we can see exactly what they were when they were living.
Here’s a great example from Venice’s Natural History Museum:
On the left is a fern and on the right is a horsetail. Or, as the Italians have it, ‘Fronde di felci e equiseti’.
Ferns:
Horsetails:
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