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Pteridophyta|TentativePlantScientist
Dryopteris lix-mas
All plants in the Pteridophyta Division are known as ferns and most have the easily recognisable fern-shape, with fronds that unfurl to form distinctive selfsimilar shaped leaves radiating from a central point. These ferns are often grown in gardens and like shady areas with moist soil. Their leaves have also been
used to demonstrate fractals, as explained here.
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Dryopteris lix-mas
However there are a smaller number of plants in the Pteridophyta Division that have very dierent forms, some do not even have leaves, others look more like
clovers than ferns.
Reproduction
Like lycophytes, pteridophytes have no owers, using spores to reproduce. The spores are produced by sporangia. All plants have sporangia in one form or
another, but in ferns these can be seen in clusters, called sori (singular: sorus). Sori on ferns are yellow, brown or black and are usually found on the backs of
leaves.
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Pteridophyta|TentativePlantScientist
Also like lycophytes, the pteridophyteshave a distinct sporophyte and gametophyte generation, with the sporophyte generation
the dominant one, in ferns the sporophyte generation is the one with the leafy fronds. In lycophytes the sporophyte grows out of
the gametophyte, the two are attached, however, with pteridophytes the gametophyte is a completely dierent plant. The fern
gametophyte is only small, a few millimetres across, often growing under the ground and with primitive rhizoids instead of roots.
Fern gametophyte
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Pteridophyta|TentativePlantScientist
When researching distribution in Britain and Ireland, I found this website very useful http://www.ferns.rogergolding.co.uk/index.html
Psilotum nudum
Ophioglossales
Like the plants in Psilotales, these are not very fern-like to look at. They consist of moonworts, adders tongues and grape ferns.
These plants contain a lot of chromosomes, with one species, Ophioglossum reticulatum (looks similar to the Ophioglossum
vulgatum seen right), containing a total of 1,260 (humans have 46 and most animals and plants have between 20 and 60).
Although Ophioglossum vulgatum looks a little like an arum lily, it is not the same at all, the central part is not a ower, but the
sporophyte. Their gametophytes live below ground and use fungi to obtain their food rather than using sunlight.
Ophioglossum vulgatum
Equisetales
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Pteridophyta|TentativePlantScientist
Equisetum
Equisetum is the only surviving genus of the Equisetopsida Class, but it is a diverse genus growing all around the world, some are even aquatic. About twelve
dierent species grow in the UK. These plants have a a distinctive appearance, single green stems that photosynethesize to compensate for the leaves that are
reduced in size. Over three hundred million years ago horsetails grew up to 30 metres high and helped to form the rst forests.
Marattiales
Angiopteris
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Pteridophyta|TentativePlantScientist
There is only one family in this order and all the ferns within it grow in the tropics. Some species have fern-like leaves, other have less divided leaves (see photo
above). Some are giant with the fronds reaching up to 9m in length. Plants within this order can be recognised because their spore cases are fused together to
form one long sorus. (see photo above)
Osmundales
Osmundales have been around for 210 million years, but only four genera are still living. They have fairly typical fern leaf shapes. Osmunda is the only fern that
grows in the UK, it has photosynthetic fronds and non-photosynthetic, spore bearing fronds, which are brown, often referred to as owers. Other than
Osmunda, ferns in this order are tropical.
Osmunda regalis
Hymenophyllales
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Pteridophyta|TentativePlantScientist
These are known as the lmy ferns, their leaves are only one cell thick between the veins, which gives them a delicate, gauzy appearance, some have a typical
fern-shape to their leaves, but others not. The sori are on the edges of the leaves rather than the back. Most are tropical, but some can be found in temperate
rainforests. Three species have been found in Britain and Ireland.
Gleicheniales
Dipteris conjugata
These are tropical ferns, some with forked leaves arranged in a circle, others with fern-like leaves. There are only three families.
Schizaeales
This order contains three families, with most species found in the tropics and a few
temperate, although none in the UK. Ferns in this order have delicate leaves, some with
ferny appearance. In this order is Lygodium, a climbing fern that has become a problematic
weed in America. It has two dierent types of leaf divided leaves containing the sporangia
and entire leaf just for photosynthesizing, (picture here.)
Anemia rotundifolia
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Salviniales
Ferns in this order are aquatic and mostly found in South America or Oceana. In this order are Azolla the worlds smallest fern
with leaves so tiny they look a little like duckweed; Marsilea that look like four leaved clovers (pictured) and pillwort that looks like
quillwort, with thread-shaped leaves. Salviniales either oat or grow in mud. Three species have been found in Britain and
Ireland.
Marsilea mutica
Cyatheales
This order contains the tree ferns, one, Cyathea medullaris, can grow up to 20m. Tree ferns do not have wood and bark like other trees, instead they have
modied roots growing above ground to form a mat that supports a slender stem, allowing the plant to grow tall. As shown below, tree ferns are often covered
with hairs, and sometimes scales. All have typical fern-shaped leaves. The tree fern families are Cyatheaceae and Dicksoniaceae, Metaxyaceae and Cibotiaceae.
Ferns in this order tend to be tropical, but a few are temperate. Dicksonia are sometimes grown in gardens in the UK but they need winter protection if the
temperature drops below freezing. Cyathea have also been grown successfully in the UK.
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Polypodiales
This order contains 80% of worlds ferns, 250 genera and 9,000 species. They grow everywhere except Antarctica. Many have typical fern-shaped leaves, but not
all (as seen in photo below). This is the order that contains most ornamental ferns found in gardens in the UK, for example Adiantum, Blechnum, Woodsia,
Polystichum, Onoclea, Matteuccia, Dryopteris, Asplenium (with entire leaves), Athyrium (Japanese Painted Fern) and some of these are native. Polypodiales also
contains Pteridium, or bracken.
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Gleicheniaceae and Hymenophyllaceae, but the vast majority of ferns only appeared about 75mya, around the time that orchids and lilies (both very recently
evolved plants) appeared.
Potato Fern
Solanopteris brunei is the potato fern in the Polypodiales Order, it grows in Central and South America in the branches of trees. Ants colonize the ferns, living
inside the potato like tubers and providing protection for the ferns in return.
This is a great web page about Solanopteris and Lecanopteris crustacea, another fern that has a symbiotic relationship with ants, some good photos.
http://www.cpukforum.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=48907
This entry was posted in Botany, Classication, Divisions and tagged Botany, Fern, Ferns, Nature, Plant Divisions, Plants, Pteridophyta, Science on June 10, 2013
[https://tentativeplantscientist.wordpress.com/2013/06/10/plant-divisions-ferns-and-horsetails/] .
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Pteridophyta|TentativePlantScientist
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