| The fossil leaf locality near Verdi, Washoe County, Nevada, looking roughly southwest. The carbonized leaves occur in the sandstones and diatomaceous shales (composed almost entirely of diatoms, a microscopic photosynthesizing single-celled algae) of the upper Miocene Hunter Creek Sandstone, dated by radiometric analyses at 5.8 million years old. Photograph originally taken with a Minolta 35mm camera. |