Fossil palms (arecaceae, coryphoideae) associated with juvenile herbivorous dinosaurs in the Upper Cretaceous Aguja Formation, Big Bend National Park, TEXAS

Seeds of two palm species conforming to the extant genus Sabal have been recovered from the Campanian (Upper Cretaceous) Aguja Formation of Big Bend National Park, Texas: Sabal bigbendense sp. nov. and Sabal bracknellense (Chandler) Mai. These remains, found together with anatomically preserved palm stems, augment previous reports of Sabalites ungeri (Lesq.) Dorf leaves from the same formation. The co-occurrence of palm seeds with numerous juvenile hadrosaur and ceratopsian bones indicates that palms closely related to modern cabbage palms may have provided fodder and shelter for young herbivorous dinosaurs. The distribution of these and other Late Cretaceous palm fossils is reviewed.