A morphometric study of early Miocene Mauritiidites from Northern South America

Palaeo-biogeographical knowledge of the monosulcate Tertiary form-genus Mauritiidites can be useful to study important palaeoecological and evolutionary questions in the Neotropical lowlands. However, the lack of taxonomic differentiation within this fossil pollen genus is a handicap, and a broad morphological and morphometric study, both in space and time, is needed to establish a consistent Mauritiidites taxonomy. This note shows a morphometric characterisation ofearly Miocene Mauritiidites from western Venezuela, as a first step. Morphologically, the specimens studied are consistent with the description of Mauritiidites franciscoi (van der Hammen) van der Hammen & Garc´ L a de Mutis 1966. Light microscope measurements show little variability in most of the parameters, except for the aperture width. However, this is considered part of the natural variability within a single pollen type, which is commonly found in the pollen of several modern palm genera and species. As a result, a single morphological and morphometric pollen type is proposed for the specimens studied. Future studies should characterise more Mauritiidites specimens from other regions and time slices, to found taxonomically-meaning differences.