Anemia colimensis Mickel

  • Authority

    Mickel, John T. & Smith, Alan R. 2004. The pteridophytes of Mexico. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 88: 1-1054.

  • Family

    Anemiaceae

  • Scientific Name

    Anemia colimensis Mickel

  • Description

    Species Description - Rhizomes horizontal, short-creeping, 4–6 mm diam.; rhizome hairs orange to dark brown; fronds erect, 20–42 cm long; stipes 1/3–1/2 the frond length, 1–1.9 mm diam., stramineous, lightly hirsute; blades ovate-deltate, tripinnate to tripinnate-pinnatifid, 10–18 cm wide, mostly catadromous, subcoriaceous; pinnae 11–14 pairs, opposite to subopposite, segments rhomboid to ovate, short-petiolate to narrowly adnate, apices obtuse, margins entire; blade surfaces with stiff unicellular hairs adaxially and multicellular hairs abaxially on veins; veins free; fertile pinnae remote from the sterile pinnae, slightly longer than the lowermost sterile pinnae and held in the same plane as the sterile portion of the blades, occasionally two pairs to wholly dimophic fronds; spores striate, the ridges broad, smooth, approximate to one another; 2n=76 (Col).

  • Discussion

    Type. Mexico. Colima: mountains 10 mi SSW of Colima on Manzanillo road, McVaugh 15537 (MICH!; isotype US!; original material entirely sterile; fertile topotype material, Mickel 1357, NY!).

    This species has the most unspecialized foliar morphology of any species in the genus with its only slightly differentiated basal pair of fertile pinnae held in the same plane as the rest of the frond. This may indicate a basal position of the species in Anemia. It grows in Colima on gypsum rocks with A. adiantifolia and A. mexicana var. makrinii, and recently has been discovered in eastern Guerrero and western Oaxaca. These recent collections are distinct in having uniformly two or more pairs of fertile pinnae, rather than one.