FERNS, CLUBMOSSES, HORSETAILS, MOSSES, 

 FUNGI, AND LICHENS 



By FRANK CAVERS, D.Sc. 

 Professor of Biology, Hartley University College, Southampton 



CHAPTER IV 

 FERNS AND THEIR RELATIVES 



WE have rather few kinds of ferns in this country, since most 

 ferns require a more thoroughly moist climate than that of 

 Britain. Our native ferns are herbaceous plants, but in tropical 

 and sub-tropical forests, and in moist climates like that of New 

 Zealand, there grow, in addition to ferns like ours, the large 

 tree-ferns, which can be seen in botanic gardens such as Kew. 

 On the whole, the ferns now living represent a family which 

 was formerly more widely distributed and formed a great part 

 of the earth's vegetation, especially during the Coal Period. 

 Many of the fern-like leaves found in the coal measures, how- 

 ever, probably belonged to a higher family, which bore seeds, 

 and formed a connecting link between Ferns and Seed-plants. 



Most of our ferns grow in moist and shaded places, but several 

 kinds are adapted for existence in exposed and dry situations. 

 Each kind has its own special home or habitat, and it would 

 be useless, for instance, to look for the delicate shade-loving 

 Lady Fern on a bleak wind-swept moor. For the same reason, 

 if we would grow ferns successfully in gardens or greenhouses, 

 we must give them as nearly as possible the sort of surroundings 

 to which they are accustomed. 



It is usually quite easy to tell whether or not a plant is a 

 fern, though some flowering plants are (when without their 

 flowers) liable to be mistaken for ferns. Asparagus is some- 

 times sold as a " fern/' while the leaves of some umbellifers - 



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