Devonian Plants of
the Rhynie Chert
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The Rhynie Chert of Scotland is a Lower Devonian deposit unique in the
world. The deposit preserves one of the worlds earliest terrestrial faunas
that once thrived around a hot springs environment. Waters from the hot
springs periodically inundated the land, swamping the plants. The silica
rich waters rapidly penetrated the plants, preserving them in exceptional
detail. The silica formed chert and this has preserved fully 3 dimensional
plants showing every detail, even right down to fungi that lived within the
cells of the plants!
All of the specimens listed on this page are sections of chert mounted on
petrographic slides and ground thin enough that light may pass through
them. Each section typically measures ~1 inch in width. Using a
microscope the details of the plants can then be seen and studied. The
fauna includes plants, spores, fungi, arthropods and more. This really is
a unique and fascinating fauna.
All thumbnails provide links to larger image files (up to 200 kb) so that the details of each
slide can be seen. Please feel free to download the images for your reference. Many are of
a large enough size that they can printed as photographs if so desired.
The species we list for each slide are not always the only ones in the slides. Careful
examination may reveal more, especially when one starts looking for the tiny spores, fungi
and fragments of arthropods. You have to look long and hard as there is so much preserved
in the chert that you just don't know what you might find!
Currently sold out.
New specimens are being prepared
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