Schizaea

Smith

5: 419, plate 9, fig. 9. 1793.

Common names: Curly-grass fern
Etymology: Greek schizein, split, i.e., split into narrow lobes
Treatment appears in FNA Volume 2.

Plants terrestrial. Roots blackish, very narrow, tangled, practically glabrous. Stems upright to reclining; hairs few celled, uniseriate. Leaves all fertile or dimorphic with some sterile, lacking blades, mainly unbranched, long-petioled. Fertile blades folded and fistlike or pectinate, pinnate, segments (digits) arising along rachis on distal 3–10 mm; sterile leaves straight or often curling. Sporangia in 2 rows. Gametophytes growing mixed with mosses, green (photosynthetic), delicately filamentous, lacking hairs. x = 77, 94, 103.

Distribution

Mainly tropical.

Discussion

Species 10 (1 in the flora).

Selected References

None.

Lower Taxa