AI – ‘Yes, abundant fossils of trees and plants, including abundant fossilized wood and leaves, have been discovered in Antarctica, providing evidence of extensive ancient forests and a much warmer climate in the distant past. These plant fossils offer insights into the continent’s prehistoric ecosystems, evolutionary changes, and past climates, which were vastly different from the icy desert Antarctica is today. Key discoveries and evidence:

• Fossil leaves and wood:These are the most common plant fossils found and indicate the existence of widespread forests in earlier geological periods, even near the South Pole. 
• Sedimentary cores:Scientists have drilled into the seabed and found fossil roots, pollen, spores, and remnants of flowering plants, which point to temperate rainforests in West Antarctica about 90 million years ago. 
• Fossil forests:Researchers have found and studied entire fossil forests from the Permian Period (around 280 million years ago), which are unique in their ability to have survived the extreme conditions of constant light and darkness at the poles. 
• Tree rings:Examining the annual rings in fossilized logs, like those found by Robert Falcon Scott in 1912, provides information about the trees’ growth and the past climate. 

What the fossils tell us:

• Ancient climates:The presence of these fossils indicates that Antarctica was once a temperate and much warmer place than it is today. 
• Adaptation to polar conditions:Scientists study these fossils to understand how plants adapted to the long periods of daylight and darkness at the poles. 
• Continental movements:The distribution of these plant fossils contributes to our understanding of how the continents have moved over millions of years.’