Ophioglossaceae

Plant Characteristics

Cultivation

Scientific Names

Ophioglossaceae >

Ophioglossaceae is a family of the order Ophioglossales of the sub-class Eusporangiatae of the class Filicinae of the Pteridophyta Division (phyllum) of the plant kingdom.^CH

Ophioglossaceae (from the genus Ophioglossum, adder's tongue, in reference to the fruiting spike). Adder's-tongue Family. Plants small or of medium size, often somewhat fleshy: leaves various, entire or often much divided, not circinate in vernation; veins forking or netted; base of leaf cap-like, enclosing the succeeding leaf: sporangia scattered, borne on the margin of the much modified fertile portion of the leaf, which is usually separated from the sterile by a stalk, globular in form; the walls several cells in thickness; annulus wanting; dehiscence by a straight horizontal or vertical fissure: prothallium subterranean, tuber-like, chlorophylless, containing mycorrhizal fungi, saprophytic.

Three genera and about 50 species occur, of general distribution. Several species of Botrychium and one of Ophioglossum are found in the eastern United States. The sheathing base of the leaf, the solitary, thick-walled sporangia without an annulus, and the subterranean saprophytic prothallia are important characteristics.

Two genera are sometimes grown in North America: Botrychium (Moonwort Ferns, Grape Ferns) and Ophioglossum (Adder's Tongue).

Source: Standard Cyclopedia of Horticulture

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References

• Standard Cyclopedia of Horticulture, by L. H. Bailey, MacMillan Co., 1963

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