

Ancient underwater plant 'could be world's first flower' - kungfudoi
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-33969640

======
pvaldes
mmmh... If this is all the evidence that they have, I can not buy the idea.

I could be wrong of course, but to me this plant is too similar to the extant
members from the order Charales, aquatic plants having structures filled with
spores that could be confused easily with fruits by a novice.

An example to compare:

[https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charophyceae#/media/File:Chara...](https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charophyceae#/media/File:CharaHispida.jpg)

The problem is that Charophycea are not flowering plants at all, they are a
type of calcified algae. Having hard tissues the fossils are easily traced
since the silurian and are well known. They have ornated oosporanges with a
structure that simulates one "seed" inside a cover.

[http://mcgregor.sbs.auckland.ac.nz/files/2011/01/dave_082_1....](http://mcgregor.sbs.auckland.ac.nz/files/2011/01/dave_082_1.jpg)

So I wonder why paleontologists see here an angiosperm. Maybe the species have
roots? To me this is a typical algae.

