Habit: Plant in soil or rock crevices; rhizome short- to long-creeping[-decumbent], generally many-branched, scales generally lance-linear, pale to dark, mid-stripe dark or not.
Leaf: < 75 cm, young leaf tip hooked or coiled; stipe cylindric, red-brown to +- black; blade generally 2--3-pinnate, generally oblong to narrowly triangular; segments generally small, +- flat or abaxially concave (from recurved margins).
Sporangia: along margin, in discrete patches to continuous, partly to completely covered by recurved margin (generally not recurved in
Myriopteris cooperae).
Species In Genus: +- 47 species: New World, especially w North America, primarily Mexico, 1 sp. in southern Africa, generally dry areas, especially sheltered in or near rocks.
Etymology: (Greek: myriad fern, from much divided leaf blades)
Note: Includes all CA members of
Cheilanthes as treated in TJM2 (2012).
Jepson eFlora Author: Ruth E.B. Kirkpatrick, Alan R. Smith, Thomas Lemieux & Edward Alverson
Reference: Grusz & Windham 2013 PhytoKeys 32: 49--64, doi: 10.3897/phytokeys.32.6733
Index of California Plant Names (ICPN; linked via the Jepson Online Interchange)Key to Myriopteris
Previous taxon: Cryptogramma cascadensisNext taxon: Myriopteris clevelandii