Phlebodium

• Authority

  Mickel, John T. & Beitel, Joseph M. 1988. Pteridophyte Flora of Oaxaca, Mexico. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 46: 1-580.

• Family

  Polypodiaceae

• Scientific Name

  Phlebodium

• Description

  Genus Description - Epiphytic or epipetric; rhizome creeping, branched, glaucous; rhizome scales concolorous, brown to golden, non-clathrate, peltately attached, surface glabrous, margin ciliate; fronds deeply pinnatifid to pinnatisect with rounded sinuses, monomorphic, articulate, stipe brown to stramineous, channelled adaxially; blade broadly oblong to subdeltate; pinnae broad, entire, chartaceous to coriaceous, usually glabrous, often glaucous; veins netted, row of costal areoles without free included veins, then one to several rows of additional areoles, these with or without free included veins; sori round, exindusiate, paraphyses absent, within areole at the union of merging, included veins, in one to seven rows between costa and segment margin; sporangia glabrous; spores bilateral, coarsely tuberculate.

• Discussion

  Chrysopteris Link, Fil. spec. 120. Sep 1841, nom. superfl. for Phlebodium. Phlebodium, as commonly construed, is a segregate genus of Polypodium s.l. found in the New World tropics and subtropics, consisting of about four species. The double included veins running to the sorus distinguish this small genus from species of Polypodium, which have free veins or a single included vein, if the veins are netted.