New York Ferns' 



Following Dr. Small's Ferns of the Southeastern Flora this 

 volume is the second in a series which may in time cover the 

 entire I'nited States. The area covered is known to the mem- 

 bers of the Torrey Clul) as the Local Flora Area, the region 

 within one hundred miles of New York City. F"ifty-eight ferns 

 and thirty-two of the fern allies — horsetails, club mosses, quill- 

 worts, and floating ferns — are described. For each, except some 

 of the quillworts, there is a full page plate showing the habit of 

 the plant with sketches of pinnae or pinnules enlarged to show 

 details of the veins and sori. The drawings are all clear and in 

 most cases show the characteristics of the fern so well that 

 accurate identification of the species can be made from them 

 without reference to the text. 



Following an introduction of 14 pages in which the area is 

 divided into major and minor regions with the ferns character- 

 istic of each listed, comes a series of keys to the orders, families, 

 tribes and genera. Unfortunately there are no page references 

 with the keys, so that after having determined the genus by aid 

 of the key one must thumb over the pages hunting, or use the 

 index. In genera with tw^o or more species keys are given. 

 Genera and species are described fully. Following the descrip- 

 tions is a paragraph giving something of the history of our 

 knowledge of the fern, its relationships, habitats and adapta- 

 bility to the garden. The scientific names used are those which 

 were first applied to each. The genera Aspidium and Aspleniiini 

 of the earlier authors have been divided in an attempt to "inter- 

 pret the fern-plants involved in more simple or natural generic 

 concepts." The smaller, non-evergreen shield ferns with simple 

 or 1 -forked veins are put in the genus Thelypteris, the evergreen 

 species — the marginal, crested, spinulose, etc. — in the genus 

 Dryopteris. The spleenworts now are in four genera, the small 

 evergreen species — wall-rue, maiden-hair spleenwort, ebony 

 spleenwort, etc. — are still Aspleniiim; the lady ferns — both 

 upland and lowland are recognized — are in the genus Athyrium ; 

 the silvery spleenwort is now Diplazium acrostichoides ; and the 

 narrow-leaved spleenwort had had a new genus, Homolosoriis, 



1 Ferns of the vicinity of New York. John Kunkel Small, 1935, The Science 

 Press. 285 pp. 85 plates. $2.50. 



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