Flowering Plants - Magnoliophyta
Flowering Plants - Magnoliophyta
Back in the dinosaur days of the late Jurrasic, 150 million years or so ago, some proto-magnolia invented flowers and a new kind of "seed in a wrapper" called an angiosperm. Flowers polinated by flying insects and complex fruits spread by animals proved so stunning an evolutionary advantage flowering plants dominated most of the world by the end of the dinosaur era.
Darwin called the sudden appearance of well developed flowering plants the "abominable mystery". Details are still being worked out, but it's possible they decended from Gigantopterids and that some form of flowers appeard as much as 250 million years ago.
Around the early Cretaceous, perhaps 140 million years ago, flowering
plants split into several camps, most importantly monocots (lilies,
grasses, palms) and dicots (eudicots (most flowering plants) and
magnollids (magnolias, laurels, etc.)). Monocots have long leaves with parallel
veins while dicots have broad leaves with radiating veins. Actually it's way
more complex and confusing than that, but that's enough for
discussing food.
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