Plate m -
WOOD’WARDIA.RADIGAISrS, Smitp,
F E R N S O F NORTH A M E R IC A . I I 7
P l a t e LXI.
WOODWARDIA RA D IC A N S , S m i t h .
Great Chain-Fern.
W o o d w a r d i a r a d i c a n s : — Root-stock stout, very chaffy
with large thin ferruginous scales, assurgent or erect, often
rising a few inches above ground ; stalks strong, eight to
twelve inches long ; fronds growing in a crown, standing
from two to ten feet high, sub-coriaceous, oblong-ovate in
outline, pinnate; rachis often producing scaly proliferous buds
near the apex (in the old-world plant); pinnæ four to fifteen
inches long, one to four inches broad, lanceolate, pinnatifid
nearly to the midrib; segments triangular-lanceolate, slightly
falcate, often acuminate, spinulose-serrate and in large plants
more or less pinnatifid; veinlets forming a single row of
oblong often sorus-bearing areoles each side of the midvein,
besides a few oblique empty areoles outside of the fertile
ones ; outer veinlets free, running into the teeth of the margin
; sori oblong, often slightly curved, the sporangia resting
in the hollowed areole, and covered by a convex indusium,
which at maturity turns back and discloses the sporangia.
Woodwardia radicans. S m i t h , in Mém. Acad. Turin, v ., p. 4 1 2 .—
S w a r t z , Syn. Fil,, p. 1 1 7 .— S c iik u i- ir , Krypt. Gew., p. 10 4 , t.
1 1 2 .— W i l l d e n o w , Sp. P I., v ., p. 4 1 8 . — I L w l f u s s , Enum.
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