Mississippi: petrified wood (state stone)
Mississippi: petrified wood (state stone)
Mississippi has a fossil, petrified wood, for its state stone, in addition to two prehistoric whales as state fossils. Petrified wood in Mississippi comes in several varieties: a nondescript type called "silicified wood," a denser type called "massive silicified wood," and a third type known as "petrified palm wood." Because it is difficult to know exactly which trees these woods came from, they are assigned to paleobotanical form genera with the suffix -oxylon (meaning "looks like") -- hence wood which resembles that of modern palms is called Palmoxylon, but may or may not be from trees closely related to modern palms.
Most of the best petrified wood from Mississippi comes from trees which grew in the state during the Oligocene Epoch, around 30 million years ago. The Gulf of Mexico's shoreline extended further north at that time, which explains why the wood is found in the more northern parts of the state.
This petrified wood formed when a tree was buried by sediment, and its tissues were replaced by silica in the groundwater. Trace minerals included within the silica impart a variety of hues, ranging from black to blue to red.
One of the best petrified wood locations in the state is the Mississippi Petrified Forest near Flora. This site has been known since the mid-19th century, but it was not until 1966 that it was named a Registered National Natural Landmark, and subsequently developed and opened to the public.
The Mississippi State Legislature recognized petrified wood as the state stone on May 14, 1976.
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