Monographs Details:
Authority:
Acevedo-RodrÃguez, Pedro & collaborators. 1996. Flora of St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 78: 1-581.
Acevedo-RodrÃguez, Pedro & collaborators. 1996. Flora of St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 78: 1-581.
Family:
Thelypteridaceae
Thelypteridaceae
Description:
Species Description - Terrestrial fern 0.5-1.2 m tall. Rhizome woody, creeping, 5- 9 mm thick, bearing at apex a few, thin, light brown, subclathrate, minutely furcate-puberulous, lanceolate scales, 1.5-2 mm long Fronds few, slightly dimorphic, mostly 50-100 cm long; stipes 15-45 cm long (longer in fertile fronds), light brown, minutely furcate-puberulous chiefly toward base. Blades oval to broadly triangular-oblong, 20-35 x 18-30 cm; pinnae 2-5(-6) pairs, narrowly oblong to elliptic-linear or oblanceolate, sessile or nearly so, abruptly acuminate, 3-6 cm broad, the margins subentire to coarsely crenate; veins 6-9 pairs, the lower 3-5 adjacent ones united and giving rise to free excurrent veinlets, the rest connivent below or at the sinus. Sori in double rows between costules; indusium lacking; sporangia more or less setulose.
Distribution and Ecology - Occasional in moist forest understory. Visually recorded by G. R. Proctor. Also on St. Croix, St. Thomas, and Tortola; Greater and Lesser Antilles, Tobago, Trinidad, and continental tropical America from Guatemala to Peru and Brazil
Species Description - Terrestrial fern 0.5-1.2 m tall. Rhizome woody, creeping, 5- 9 mm thick, bearing at apex a few, thin, light brown, subclathrate, minutely furcate-puberulous, lanceolate scales, 1.5-2 mm long Fronds few, slightly dimorphic, mostly 50-100 cm long; stipes 15-45 cm long (longer in fertile fronds), light brown, minutely furcate-puberulous chiefly toward base. Blades oval to broadly triangular-oblong, 20-35 x 18-30 cm; pinnae 2-5(-6) pairs, narrowly oblong to elliptic-linear or oblanceolate, sessile or nearly so, abruptly acuminate, 3-6 cm broad, the margins subentire to coarsely crenate; veins 6-9 pairs, the lower 3-5 adjacent ones united and giving rise to free excurrent veinlets, the rest connivent below or at the sinus. Sori in double rows between costules; indusium lacking; sporangia more or less setulose.
Distribution and Ecology - Occasional in moist forest understory. Visually recorded by G. R. Proctor. Also on St. Croix, St. Thomas, and Tortola; Greater and Lesser Antilles, Tobago, Trinidad, and continental tropical America from Guatemala to Peru and Brazil
Discussion:
Polypodium crenatum Sw., Prodr. 132. 1788, non Forssk., 1775. Goniopteris crenata C. Presl, Tent. Pterid. 183. 1836. Phegopteris crenata (C. Presl) Mett., Fil. Hort. Bot. Lips. 84. 1856.