Description

Oligocene
Florissant Shale
Florissant, Colorado, USA
14mm cone on 47mm slab from the famous Florissant Fossil Beds.

Plant. Cone. Conifer.

Chamaecyparis is a genus of conifer that includes the false cypress tree. It has been reported from the Cretaceous but is better known from the Early Cenozoic, still living today in eastern Asia and North America. In the Florissant Formation both foliage (leaves, branchlets) and cones of Chamaecyparis are found.

Today, it’s a medium-large evergreen tree growing from 20–70 m (66–230 ft) tall with foliage in flat sprays. The leaves are of two types: needle-like juvenile leaves on young seedlings up to a year old; and scale-like adult leaves.

The cones are globose to oval with 8-14 scales arranged in opposite decussate pairs. Each scale bears 2-4 small seeds.