Dinosaur plants

Unlike its cousin Tyrannosaurus, which was an aggressive carnivore and vulture with huge jaws for crushing bones, most dinosaurs were actually herbivores. And in general, the destinies of dinosaurs and the plant species of that time were very connected: the distribution of plants and their number determined whether the dinosaurs would starve or live in abundance. For this reason, as plants evolved through the Mesozoic, many dinosaur species disappeared during this period, and others appeared.
In the Mesozoic, which lasted from about 250 million years ago to about 65 million years ago, plants generally looked much different than they do today: fewer of them bloomed and were not as diverse as they are today. Among the more dominant plants were conifers, some of which we still know today - pines, redwoods, yews, araucaria, cypresses. They formed the basis of the diet of vegetarian dinosaurs.

One of the famous dinosaur plants is ginkgo (Ginkgo biloba), a very old and even rare tree, although it can be seen in several places in Serbia, including the Botanical Garden "Jevremovac" in Belgrade. Ginkgo is said to be a "living fossil" - a plant that has no living relatives. The various remains of ginkgo that have been found suggest that this deciduous gymnosperm originated in the Mesozoic and was very widespread. Today in Asia it is considered a sacred tree and is grown in palace courtyards, and grows wild only in southeast China, in mountainous areas. In Europe and America, it is grown in parks where it attracts a lot of attention with its unusual appearance: it is a deciduous tree about forty meters high, with a pyramidal canopy and leaves of a very specific shape. They are triangular with incisions at the top, and small seed embryos are formed on the female plants in the axils of the leaves. However, since the seeds smell very unpleasant, male plants are usually planted in parks Charles Darwin also wrote about living fossils in his book On the Origin of Species, where he stated that there are species that are associated with some long-extinct plants. These plants have survived to this day and he called them living fossils. In general, the name is used to denote plants and animals that existed in several geological periods, that retained some of the primitive characteristics, and that morphologically and physiologically resembled fossils — such as, for example, crocodiles, which outlived dinosaurs.

But let’s get back to the plants. During the Jurassic period, they changed significantly, and with them the appearance of the planet: many flowering plants were created. They grew quickly, easily adapted to climatic and other conditions and had vivid colors, and were an excellent source of nutrients for dinosaurs and other herbivores.

If we were to make a garden of flowering dinosaurs today, we would plant various laurels, barberries, palm trees… that thrive even in our vicinity. One of the most impressive plants in this garden would be magnolia (Magnolia grandiflora). This tree, about 25 meters high, was described in 1759 by the Swede Carl Line in "Systema Naturae", in which all living creatures were classified in an appropriate way for the first time. Magnolia is also very widespread in our country - it is found in parks and private yards, and it is recognizable by its long, dark green smooth and shiny leaves and large white flowers (hence the name grandiflora) that smell a bit like lemon.

Our dinosaur garden would also include the Australian pine (Wollemia nobilis), a conifer from the Araucariaceae family, which is one of the oldest and rarest species on the planet - the oldest found remains belonged to plants that lived about 200 million years ago. Scientists met it through discovered fossils, and until 1994, it was believed that there were no living specimens. That year, in Australia, in Volemia National Park in New South Wales, about 150 kilometers from Sydney,one specimen was discovered: the keeper David Noble, a good connoisseur of botany, quite by accident, in a very inaccessible part of the Park, came across this about 30 meters high tree that seemed interesting to him. He took a twig with him, expecting that some of the botanists would be able to identify the species, but he soon discovered that this pine (which is so called, although it is not a real pine), is completely unknown, and that there are no living relatives on Earth.

After it was discovered and named after the national park in which it grew and after David Noble, botanists began to propagate this plant and to spread the specimens all over the world. So far, it has been determined that some specimens managed to survive at temperatures up to 12 degrees Celsius below zero, but also that they are very sensitive and prone to disease. Precisely to protect this plant, the location of the pine found by Noble is kept in great secrecy. On the other hand, in order to multiply and spread as much as possible, the Australian pine was promoted as a suitable New Year's tree on that continent. Also, specimens that grow in parks and gardens are so valuable and important that they are usually planted inside large cages to avoid the possibility of damage and infection.