Myriopteris fendleri
| Myriopteris fendleri | |
|---|---|
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| Clade: | Tracheophytes |
| Division: | Polypodiophyta |
| Class: | Polypodiopsida |
| Order: | Polypodiales |
| Family: | Pteridaceae |
| Genus: | Myriopteris |
| Species: | M. fendleri
|
| Binomial name | |
| Myriopteris fendleri | |
| Synonyms | |
| |
Myriopteris fendleri, formerly known as Cheilanthes fendleri,[2] is a species of fern in the Pteridaceae family (subfamily Cheilanthoideae) with the common name Fendler's lip fern.[3] It is native to the southwest United States and northern Mexico.[4]
Description
Leaves grow from a short- to long-creeping rhizome 1 to 3 millimeters (0.04 to 0.1 in) in diameter.[5][6] It is covered with shiny, uniformly-brown lanceolate scales[5][6] about 2 millimeters (0.08 in) long, without marginal teeth or projections.[5][7] Sometimes they are a paler brown with a dark brown central stripe.[7] The scales are straight or slightly twisted, and loosely appressed (pressed against the surface of the rhizome),[6] often deciduous on older parts of the rhizome.[5][6]
The fronds are more or less scattered, and they do not unfold as fiddleheads like typical ferns (noncircinate vernation).[6] The leaves, including the stalk, are 7 to 30 centimeters (3 to 10 in).[6] The stipe (the stalk of the leaf below the blade) makes up about half the total length of the leaf,[5] and ranges from 3 to 17 centimeters (1.2 to 6.7 in) long.[7] It is dark brown[6] to a dark shiny reddish-brown[5] or purplish-black,[7] and rounded rather than grooved on the upper surface.[5][6] Scattered scales, but no hairs, are present on the stipe[5] and rachis (leaf axis).[6] The loosely-overlapping scales are linear, whitish in color and 1 to 2 millimeters (0.04 to 0.08 in) long.[5] Slightly wider, lanceolate scales with long teeth at the base may also be present on the stipe.[7]
The leaf blades are narrowly oblong to lanceolate[5][7] and even ovate-deltate in shape,[6] typically measuring 4 to 14 centimeters (1.6 to 5.5 in) long[7] and 1 to 5 centimeters (0.39 to 2.0 in) wide.[5][6][7] They are typically tripinnate (cut into pinnae, pinnules, and pinnulets) at the base;[7] the pinnulets may be further divided into segments.[5][6]
Myriopteris fendleri is a small fern growing from a wandering rhizome. The leaves are about 6 to 12 inches long and about 2 inches wide and are glabrous on the adaxial (top) surface. There are wide lance shaped brown (initially much paler) scales without cilia on the costae (pinna midribs). The blade is 3 to 4 pinnate at the base and leaflets are lobed and flat when first leafing out and later curl adaxially to cover sporangia and appear more bead like from the top view. The leaves are often held upright but may be parallel to the ground or at intermediate angles.[4]
Range and habitat
Myriopteris fendleri is native to the southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico.[5] In the United States, it is found throughout Arizona east to western Texas and as far north as northern Colorado, with scattered populations in northern Texas and Oklahoma.[8]
It prefers north facing slopes with some shade, but can be found among rocks elsewhere.[4]
Taxonomy
Myriopteris fendleri was first described by Sir William Jackson Hooker in 1852, as Cheilanthes fendleri, based on material collected by Augustus Fendler in New Mexico in 1848. The epithet presumably honors Fendler.[9] In 1872, Eugène Fournier, in his treatment of Mexican ferns, chose to recognize the genus Myriopteris as a segregate of Cheilanthes, and transferred C. fendleri there as Myriopteris fendleri.[10]
By a strict application of the principle of priority, Oliver Atkins Farwell transferred the species to the genus Allosorus as Allosorus myriophyllus var. fendleri in 1931, that genus having been published before Cheilanthes.[11] Farwell's name was rendered unnecessary when Cheilanthes was conserved over Allosorus in the Paris Code published in 1956.
The development of molecular phylogenetic methods showed that the traditional circumscription of Cheilanthes is polyphyletic. Convergent evolution in arid environments is thought to be responsible for widespread homoplasy in the morphological characters traditionally used to classify it and the segregate genera, such as Myriopteris, that have sometimes been recognized. On the basis of molecular evidence, Amanda Grusz and Michael D. Windham revived the genus Myriopteris in 2013 for a group of species formerly placed in Cheilanthes, including Myriopteris fendleri.[2]
In 2018, Maarten J. M. Christenhusz transferred the species to Hemionitis as H. fendleri, as part of a program to consolidate the cheilanthoid ferns into that genus.[12]
Based on plastid DNA sequence analysis, Myriopteris fendleri is very closely related to Myriopteris wootonii.[13]
References
- ^ NatureServe (November 1, 2024). "Cheilanthes fendleri". NatureServe Explorer. Arlington, Virginia. Retrieved November 17, 2024.
- ^ a b Grusz & Windham 2013.
- ^ "Myriopteris fendleri (Fendler's Lipfern)". iNaturalist. Retrieved 2022-10-25.
- ^ a b c "Vascular Plants of the Gila Wilderness".
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Mickel & Smith 2004, p. 194.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Windham & Rabe 1993.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Lellinger 1985, p. 147.
- ^ Kartesz 2014.
- ^ Hooker 1858, p. 103.
- ^ Fournier 1872, p. 125.
- ^ Farwell 1931, p. 285.
- ^ Christenhusz, Fay & Byng 2018, p. 13.
- ^ Grusz et al. 2014.
Works cited
- Christenhusz, Maarten J. M.; Fay, Michael F.; Byng, James W. (2018). Plant Gateway's the Global Flora: A practical flora to vascular plant species of the world. Vol. 4. ISBN 978-0-9929993-9-1.
- Farwell, Oliver Atkins (1931). "Fern Notes II. Ferns in the Herbarium of Parke, Davis & co". American Midland Naturalist. 12 (8): 233–311. doi:10.2307/2420088. JSTOR 2420088.
- Fournier, Eugène (1872). Mexicanas Plantas (in French). Vol. 1. Paris: Typographeo Republicae.
- Grusz, Amanda L.; Windham, Michael D.; Yatskievych, George; Huiet, Lane; Gastony, Gerald J.; Pryer, Kathleen M. (2014). "Patterns of Diversification in the Xeric-adapted Fern Genus Myriopteris (Pteridaceae)". Systematic Botany. 39 (3): 698–714. doi:10.1600/036364414X681518. JSTOR 24546228. S2CID 16969741.
- Grusz, Amanda L.; Windham, Michael D. (2013). "Toward a monophyletic Cheilanthes: The resurrection and recircumscription of Myriopteris (Pteridaceae)". PhytoKeys (32): 49–64. doi:10.3897/phytokeys.32.6733. PMC 3881352. PMID 24399906.
- Hooker, Sir William Jackson (1858). Species Filicum. Vol. 2. London: William Pamplin.
- Kartesz, John T. (2014). "Myriopteris". Biota of North America Program.
- Lellinger, David B. (1985). A Field Manual of the Ferns & Fern-Allies of the United States & Canada. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press. ISBN 0-87474-603-5.
- Mickel, John T.; Smith, Alan R. (2004). The Pteridophytes of Mexico. Memoirs of the New York Botanical Garden. Vol. 88. Bronx, New York: New York Botanical Garden. ISBN 978-0-89327-488-7.
- Windham, Michael D.; Rabe, Eric W. (1993). "Cheilanthes fendleri". In Flora of North America Editorial Committee (ed.). Flora of North America North of Mexico. Vol. 2: Pteridophytes and Gymnosperms. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press.