Maxon — Notes on Western Species of Pellaea. 181 



them more than 10 cm. long; (2) specimens from the vicinity of Teha- 

 chapi, in Kern County, with exceedingly small, numerous, close-set 

 segments; (3) long-stalked fronds from Lassen County (Austin 1367) 

 which suggest P. brachyptera but are readily distinguished from that by 

 their very much longer secondary rachises and shorter, smaller pinnules. 

 The northern specimens show a tendency toward simple pinnules (sec- 

 ondary pinnae); whereas in specimens from Whitewater (G. R. Vasey) 

 the larger secondary pinnae consist of as many as 9 to 11 sessile segments. 

 Entirely characteristic specimens are at hand from northern Lower Cali- 

 fornia {Mearns 3193, 3791); also from Santa Catalina Island, where the 

 plant is called "tea-fern," from its use for tea. According to A. A. 

 Eaton, who has discussed this species very interestingly,* it is called also 

 " black fern " and " poison-fern," the latter name indicating its reputed 

 poisonous effect upon sheep. 



The fronds of P. mucronata are almost invariably fertile. The segments 

 are thick, sharply mucronulate, revolute to the middle at all stages of 

 growth, and often transversely corrugate at maturity, with the margins 

 closely repand and finely sinuate-dentate. The more subdivided lamina 

 and the absence of sterile fronds will at once distinguish this species from 

 the occasional fronds of P. longimucronata with small segments. The 

 relationship with P. compacta is decidedly closer. 



Pellaea Wrightiana Hook. Sp. Fil. 2 : 142. pi. 115. B. 1858. 



Pellaea mucronata D. C. Eaton in Torr. U. S. & Mex. Bound. Bot. 233. 

 1859, in part; not Allosorus mucronatus D. C. Eaton, 1856. 



Type.— Collected in New Mexico, in 1851, by Charles Wright (no. 2130), 

 the exact locality not stated. According to data in the Gray Herbariumt 

 it was collected on "mountains around the Cobre. On rocky ledges, 

 October 20." "Cobre" is one of the names for Santa Rita, a mining 

 camp in Grant County, altitude 1900 meters, about 15 miles east of Silver 

 City.+ A specimen of Wright 2130, agreeing closely with Hooker's figure, 

 is in the U. S. National Herbarium. 



Distribution. — Southwestern Oklahoma and central Texas to Arizona 

 and Lower California. 



Fronds mostly fertile, at least in the upper half or two-thirds, occa- 

 sionally wholly sterile; lamina linear or in large well developed speci- 

 mens sometimes lanceolate or narrowly triangular, the basal pinnae 

 reduced or not; pinnae short, in some plants all but the upper one trifol. 

 iolate (these gradually simpler), in others the middle and sometimes the 

 basal pinnae with 2 or occasionally 3 pairs of pinnules besides the large 

 terminal one, the upper pinnae trifoliolate, finally simple; pinnules dis- 

 tant, nearly equal, relatively large, semiadnate or sessile, the fertile ones 

 closely revolute one-half to one-third the distance to the middle, flatfish, 

 the margin entire or nearly so, slightly altered, evident at the apex as a 



• Fern Bull. 12 : 113, 114. 1904. 



t See Standley, Contr. U. S. Nat. Herb. 13 : 175. 1910. 



J Op. cit. 170. 



