Common Name: DEER FERN FAMILY Habit: Plants in soil [climbing]; rhizome short- to long-creeping to erect, scaly; new growth often +- red. Leaf: of 1 or 2 kinds, fertile, sterile; stipe in ×-section with vascular strands in circle; blade [(simple or 2-pinnate)] deeply pinnately lobed to 1-pinnate, pinnae deeply pinnately lobed or not, hairs generally 0; veins free or netted. Sporangia: sori linear to oblong, along veins parallel to nearest midrib; indusium shaped +- like sorus, opening towards nearest midrib; stalk cells in 2--3 rows; spores elliptic, scar linear. Genera In Family: 24 genera, +- 250 species: worldwide, especially tropics; several species cultivated. Note: Until recently, most species usually treated in an extremely morphologically heterogeneous Blechnum, with some species more closely related to other genera (such as Brainea, Doodia, Sadleria) than to other species of Blechnum. eFlora Treatment Author: Carl J. Rothfels, John C. Game, Alan R. Smith & Thomas Lemieux Scientific Editor: Bruce G. Baldwin, Alan R. Smith, Thomas J. Rosatti.
Habit: Rhizome short-creeping. Leaf: of 2 kinds, fertile > sterile, with much narrower pinnae or lobes; adjacent pinnae fused at their junction with rachis, lower pinnae gradually reduced; veins of sterile leaves free. Etymology: (Latin/Greek: ostrich fern) Note:Struthiopteris is relatively isolated in Blechnaceae, more closely related to the monotypic genera Blechnidium and (possibly) Brainea than to Blechnum (de Gaspar et al. 2016 Cladistics in press). eFlora Treatment Author: Carl J. Rothfels, John C. Game, Alan R. Smith & Thomas Lemieux
Struthiopteris spicant (L.) Weiss
NATIVE Leaf: stipe short, base +- black, with persistent +- brown scales; sterile leaves forming rosette, spreading to arching, firm, deeply pinnately lobed to 1-pinnate, generally < 1 m, 2--10 cm wide; pinnae generally 20--80 pairs, 5--8 mm wide, entire to shallowly crenate, lower gradually reduced to semicircular lobes < 5 mm; fertile leaves appearing after sterile, in center of rosette, +- erect, 1-pinnate, > sterile, pinnae +- 2 mm wide, unlobed. Chromosomes: 2n=68. Ecology: Shaded, neutral to acid moist areas; Elevation: +- 0--1500 m. Bioregional Distribution: NCo, NCoRO, n SNH, CCo, SnFrB; Distribution Outside California: to Alaska, Idaho; Europe, southwestern Asia, northern Africa. Note: Locally common. Synonyms: Blechnum spicant (L.) Roth Jepson eFlora Author: Carl J. Rothfels, John C. Game, Alan R. Smith & Thomas Lemieux Index of California Plant Names (ICPN; linked via the Jepson Online Interchange) Previous taxon: Struthiopteris Next taxon: Woodwardia
Botanical illustration including Struthiopteris spicant
Citation for this treatment: Carl J. Rothfels, John C. Game, Alan R. Smith & Thomas Lemieux 2016, Struthiopteris spicant, in Jepson Flora Project (eds.) Jepson eFlora, Revision 4, https://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/eflora/eflora_display.php?tid=45778, accessed on April 23, 2024.
Citation for the whole project: Jepson Flora Project (eds.) 2024, Jepson eFlora, https://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/eflora/, accessed on April 23, 2024.
No expert verified images found for Struthiopteris spicant.
MAP CONTROLS 1. You can change the display of the base map layer control box in the upper right-hand corner.
2. County and Jepson Region polygons can be turned off and on using the check boxes.
(Note: any qualifiers in the taxon distribution description, such as 'northern', 'southern', 'adjacent' etc., are not reflected in the map above, and in some cases indication of a taxon in a subdivision is based on a single collection or author-verified occurence).
Data provided by the participants of the
Consortium of California Herbaria.
MAP LEGEND View all CCH records All markers link to CCH specimen records. The original determination is shown in the popup window.
Blue markers indicate specimens that map to one of the expected Jepson geographic subdivisions (see left map). Purple markers indicate specimens collected from a garden, greenhouse, or other non-wild location.
Yellow markers indicate records that may provide evidence for eFlora range revision or may have georeferencing or identification issues.
READ ABOUT YELLOW FLAGS
CCH collections by month
Duplicates counted once; synonyms included.
Species do not include records of infraspecific taxa, if there are more than 1 infraspecific taxon in CA.
Blue line denotes eFlora flowering time (fruiting time in some monocot genera).