Nephrolepis
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Authority
Acevedo-Rodríguez, Pedro & collaborators. 1996. Flora of St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 78: 1-581.
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Family
Nephrolepidaceae
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Scientific Name
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Description
Genus Description - Medium-sized terrestrial, epiphytic or occasionally epilithic ferns. Rhizomes erect and short, sometimes decumbent, densely clothed with scales, and usually proliferating by means of elongate slender stolons, rarely producing underground tubers. Fronds clustered, crowded, not articulate to the rhizome, stipitate, the stipes usually short. Blades linear to linear-oblong, normally 1-pinnate, the apex often appearing to be of indeterminate growth or nearly so; pinnae numerous, articulate to the rachis and eventually deciduous; veins free, 1- to 4-branched, all but the fertile ones reaching nearly to the margins, with ends thickened (hydathodes) and often secreting a small, white dry exudate of calcium carbonate on the adaxial side. Sori usually terminal on the first distal vein branches, medial to submarginal, in a single row on either side of the midvein; indusium lunate to orbicular, attached at the sinus; paraphyses absent; spores ellipsoid, monolete, the surface irregularly tuberculate to rugose.
Distribution and Ecology - A pantropical genus of more than 20 species.