Synchronous collapse terrestrial and marine ecosystems

The Permian-Triassic boundary section Oksedal in Jameson Land, East Greenland (fig. 1), contains an abundant and well-preserved marine fauna as well as terrestrial palynomorphs. This made it possible, for the first time, to compare the biotic crisis of the marine and terrestrial realms (fig. 2) using the same samples from the same section. The sediments record a negative excursion in ¹³δC-carb values of 8-9‰, and in ¹³δC-org values of 10-11‰. The presence of the conodont Hindeodus parvus, combined with the ¹³δC-carb record, enables correlation with the global stratotype section at Meishan. This shows that the Greenland section is the most expanded P-Tr section known. Collapse of marine and terrestrial ecosystems took between 10 and 60 thousand year. It took a further few hundred thousand years for the final disappearance of distinctive Permian gymnosperm taxa. Collapse of the terrestrial and marine ecosystems began at the same stratigraphic level and preceded the sharp negative excursion in the ¹³δC record.

Twitchett R.J., Looy C.V., Morante R., Visscher H. and Wignall P.B., 2001. Rapid and synchronous collapse of marine and terrestrial ecosystems during the end-Permian mass extinction event. Geology 29: 351-354.