Various

“ Now, the student of fern species is quite inclined to think of these “freaks,” as he calls them, much as others would if they were animal. The botanist may admire the form, hue and perfume of the gardener’s rose, but this is not the rose he cares to study. In the early numbers of The Fern Bulletin, upward of sixty American ferns have been put on 120 record as bearing forked or tasselled fronds, and so far as the editor is aware, not one of these has been taken into cultivation and only a very few have been given names. ”

“ No true fern lover in either case would knowingly destroy one of Nature’s own novelties in the way I described by denuding it repeatedly of its fronds for herbarium purposes in situ, when by removing and cultivating it he could also, in either case, not only gratify his own special taste more fully, but could afford much gratification to a host of other fern lovers of either class. That “students of ferns know that many fern forms are due to varying conditions of soil, light, moisture, etc., and are inclined to pay very little attention to them” I accept at once, ranking myself with them ”

“ If you are interested in plants as living things—their uses, habits, and curious methods of getting on in the world—this is just the publication you want. A large number of fern students are already readers of the American Botanist, but to induce others to become such, we offer the last three numbers for this year, all the numbers of 1904, for the regular subscription price of $1.00 if received before the first of January. ”

“ In a series of fronds examined there seemed to be no corelation between the color of the scales and the glands on the indusium, there being fronds with light scales and no glands, others with dark centered scales and many glands, and still others the exact opposites of these. Intermedium may be distinguished as a form, but it is certainly far less distinct than such plants as Nephrodium cristatum Clintonianum or Pteris aquilina pseudocaudata and would probably never have appeared in our lists but for the fact that much has been made of the forms of this species in other lands. ”

“ You may be sure the book will be consulted many times next year and in the years to follow and every time this happens the giver will be thought of with pleasure. If you have a young friend who is beginning to get interested in Nature, crystalize his tendency by giving him this book. The illustrations will make him a lover of ferns and the text will make him wise about them. There are 225 illustrations and 340 pages of text. No other fern book is so full, so clear or more accurate. The key for identifying the ferns has illustrations of fruit-dots and even a child can name the ferns by its use. ”

“ As is well known the British fern hunter and fern cultivator is most interested in the abnormal forms of ferns, and as a result so many of these have been described that a complete list numbers more than a thousand, though there were less than seventy-five native species to begin with. Mr. Druery’s task has been to select from this list the really meritorious varieties from the cultural standpoint. ”

“ The Fern-floras of the States will be continued, those for California and Florida being expected to appear early 124 in the year, followed by others now in preparation. The series of portraits of fern students will be discontinued for the present, to make room for a new series on exotic ferns in which will be illustrated the ferns of unusual appearance from other lands, together with descriptive notes upon their haunts and habits. In nearly every fern collector’s herbarium are species of which little more than the name is known. ”

“ The Forms of the Spinulose Wood Fern.—It is well-known to fern students that much more attention has been paid to the forms of ferns on the other side of the Atlantic than on this. Since the same species are often common to both localities, it is but natural that the early students of American ferns should pay rather more attention to the mere forms of species common to Great Britain and America than their systematic importance warrants. ”

“ Every time the Fern Bulletin is late, doubtless half the subscribers wonder what the editor can be doing to prevent the magazine from appearing on time. The editor, therefore, rises to explain that this publication would always be issued promptly if correspondents would send in copy in season. We endeavor to have each issue ready for the printer a month before publication, and yet there are many of our contributors, who, having arranged for space in a number, will wait until two or three days before the publication date to send in copy. ”

“ The reference to seven-toed kittens and two-headed rabbits, as fair parallels to the finest fern varieties in the mind of the average student, is a poor compliment to the student who would certainly benefit by a better acquaintance with the plumose section of varieties at any rate. ”

“ This is not the only instance on record of Isoetes species intergrading. Mr. A. A. Eaton has noted that the variety Californica of I. melanopoda intergrades on the one hand with I. Howelli and on the other with the type, while specimens referred to I. mexicana by Underwood have since been identified as I. Orcuttii and I. melanopoda. All this seems to indicate that the systematists have not yet got hold of the proper characters upon which to found specific differences, and there is here a chance for a philosophical botanist to distinguish himself. It is not enough that the plants look different ”

“ And the fact is that certain species from the north and others from the south do meet within its borders. This also accounts for the large number of species found in the State: California and Texas, the one State having four times the area of New York, and the other five times that area, being the only ones which contain as large or a larger number of species. ”

“ Chapman’s flora of the same region is fairly conservative, while this one goes to the opposite extreme, being noticeable for the greatly increased number of species and an equal lack of what the older book is inclined to consider varieties or forms. This gives students a choice of books, but it is probable that a beginner will have much difficulty in identifying his plants by the aid of the new one, because of the many closely related forms described as separate species. The book will appeal more to advanced students specializing in a few orders or genera. ”

“ This, the most strongly marked of the forms in the Atlantic States failed to receive a place in the recently published index to the described species of Botrychium. It can be distinguished at a glance in field or herbarium by its broad and slightly divided pinnules, and is very common in central New York. The fronds, notwithstanding their broad pinnules, are among the smallest of the group. If any of our forms of Botrychium are entitled to sub-specific rank, this is certainly the one. ”

“ The venation, however, is a sufficiently distinct feature. In patens the basal veins in each pinnule run to the sinus, uniting at, or just below, it; in molle they unite at some distance from the sinus from whence a single vein runs to the sinus. According to Jenman, patens has a creeping horizontal rootstock with the fronds arranged in two lines along it, while molle has an erect rootstock. The fronds of the latter are also softer and thinner.
Naturalization of an Exotic Fern.—Records of ferns becoming naturalized in new regions are very rare. ”

“ The growth of the stem is indeterminate, but as each succeeding section is a little smaller than the one below, the time arrives in the history of each when no more can be pushed out and the growth ceases. The undeveloped internodes soon die and thus the stem, if it grows at all, must put its energy into branches, as the silex coating prevents its increase in diameter. ”

“ Druery, who is familiar with them all, that a large number come true from spores.
Experiments with flowering plants have shown that the thickness of leaves and the amount of cutting of their edges, may be altered by different degrees of moisture, sunshine, etc., to which they are exposed, and we may infer as much for the ferns. 116 This being so, it is not difficult to account for the slight variations in cutting exhibited in plants from widely separated points in the United States. ”

“ We grant that some of these attain forms that merit admiration for their beauty, or oddity, as showing what Nature can do in the way of leaves, but we maintain that were these forms animal, instead of vegetable, they would excite only feelings of repulsion. ”

“ Perhaps Nature thought it foolish to waste so many little natural hothouses, and put in each a pinch of the stuff she makes ferns of. If so, she must view with much pride the result of her experiment.
Miss Angie M. Ryon, Niantic, Conn., reports finding fine plants of Ophioglossum vulgatum upon a very rocky hillside, the roots crowding themselves between the bits of rock that had been broken up by loads of heavy timber passing over them the previous year. The plants were exposed to the full rays of the sun for most of the day. ”

“ Such a collection saves wear and tear on the general herbarium and often excites a real and lasting interest in the ferns. It should contain, of course, the walking and climbing ferns, the little Schizaea, the hartstongue, the maidenhair, the cinnamon and sensitive ferns, etc. Some of the gold and silver ferns might be included, the star fern is desirable and various species of grape fern will add to the interest. A few finely cut fronds like that of Dicksonia may be added, with such other species as suggest themselves on account of oddity in fruiting. ”

“ It is the only American form of heimale known to me, except occasionally intermedium which bears branches with the first 111 effort of growth. All the others develop them, if at all, after the stem has ceased to grow, and the vegetative energy, having no other outlet, pushes out a few of the latent buds lying between the ridges at the nodes. ”

“ To those who prefer the less elaborate manual, Dr. Small’s book will always be indispensable for reference.
Mr. Charles T. Druery, well known on this side of the Atlantic as an enthusiastic cultivator of ferns, has issued a book devoted principally to British fern varieties, which he has named “The Book of British Ferns.” [3] In this work he has been assisted by various members of the British Pteridological Society, an association similar to our Fern Chapter, and of which Mr. Druery is president. ”

“ Stems 1 to 21⁄2 feet high, 1 to 3 lines wide, about 24 angled, rough, with cross-walls of silex, rarely with ends elevated to two rows of tubercles; stomata in single rows, rarely double for a short distance, each stoma connected at top and bottom with its opposite by rows of rosulæ formed by the silex bands of the grooves throwing up tubercles on each cell of the epidermis, which open at top to circular jagged disks, these often obscured later by a washing of silex, but always shown near the tops of the stems and on the branches ”

“ It may be a question whether the Connecticut stations for Asplenium montanum lie farther north than the New York stations, but it is certain that there can be but little difference between them in this respect.
III. The Adirondack Region, extending as far south as Little Falls.—Here there are a few of the northern species that descend to their southern limit in this country. Among them may 98 be mentioned Nephrodium fragrans, Polystichum Braunii, Woodsia glabella, and W. hyperborea. There are also two Lycopods to be included in this list, L. annotinum pungens and L. Sitchense. ”

“ In some of its characters, such as sheaths and persistent, incurved leaf-bases, this plant resembles Funstoni, but the section is similar to hiemale. An abundance of material might show this to be a good species. The only thing I have seen that approaches it in texture is E. Sieboldi Milde from Japan, which is even more grass-like.
4. Pumilum var. nov. Cespitose; stems in a dense cluster, 6 to 15 inches tall, 8 to 16 angled, 1⁄2 to 1 line in diameter, mostly geniculate at the lower nodes, nearly all the joints tumid, the lower gibbous; ridges with cross-bands of silex, grooves naked ”

“ Equis. 593. Fertile stems 3 feet high, 16 angled; sheaths short, the lowest fuscous; teeth persistent, white, crispate; stomata often of 1 to 3 lines to a series, which are separated by 4 to 6 cells.
Collected by Drummond at the Brazos river in Texas. It is very aberrant, but is placed here on account of its anatomy. I have not seen specimens of this.
7. Affine (Eng.) (E. robustum affine Eng.) E. hiemale of American authors, not L. Stems 18 to 30 inches high, 2 to 5 lines in diameter, finely 16 to 40 angled, dark green, angles with broad bands of silex, rarely with two rows of tubercles. ”

“ Plants of various appearance, now 15 inches high and 4 lines wide, now 71⁄2 to 8 feet tall and 8 lines wide, 25-40 angled; the ridges with two distinct rows of tubercles or occasionally with transverse bands of silex, the grooves abundantly supplied with rosulæ, either in regular rows or scattered, often indistinct on old stems because of a heavy deposit of silex; sheaths as broad as long, with a broad or narrow black or dark brown ring just above the base, an ashy band in the middle and another usually narrow dark band at top. ”

“ On dry open rocks. Rather 105 scarce. Little Falls, Paine; Adirondacks. Professor Peck; Washington Heights, W. W. Denslow. Plentiful in the extreme southeast, Clute.
FERNWORT NOTES—IV. By Willard N. Clute.
Nephrodium Molle in Florida.—Mr. James H. Ferriss recently called my attention to specimens of Nephrodium molle received from Florida with the suggestion that this species might be native to the State. On this point, Reasoner Brothers, the well-known plant dealers, have written him that they no longer grow the fern since it is abundant in a wild state and easily obtained when wanted. ”