DESCRIPTIONS OF N.Z. FERNS. 121 



herbaceous character of these ferns seems to make them so attractive to these insects 

 that it is very difficult to protect them from the attacks of the little vermin, who eat 

 the young buds before they have time to unroll. Standing the pot in a saucer of 

 water, or else putting a bell-glass over it, with its bottom edge resting in water, to 

 prevent the insects from creeping under it, are good protections. 



The next group is called the " Asplenium bulbiferum" one, but as the only New 

 Zealand fern belonging to it is 



ASPLENIUM BULBIFERUM (As-ple-ne-um bul-bif-e-rum), 



MAORI NAME " MOKU," 

 PLATE VI., No. 5, 

 The description of the plant will serve for that of the group too. This is the 

 commonest of all New Zealand Asplenia, being found in the bush throughout the 

 colony from a little above sea-level to 4000ft. elevation or upwards. It is, however, 

 absent occasionally from considerable tracts of country. It is often 3ft. or more in 

 height. Its young shoots are cooked and eaten by the Maoris, and are very like 

 asparagus in flavour and tenderness ; so that surveyors and others working in the bush 

 find them a very pleasant addition to their bill of fare in the spring of the year. The 

 plant is found in North India, Penang, Samoa, New Caledonia, S.E. Africa, and 

 adjacent islands, Central America, Australia, Tasmania, and the Chatham Islands ; 

 and is also called by the synonyms of A. treraulum, A. Fabianum, and Coenopteris 

 appendiculata. It has a stout, erect, slightly scaly rhizome, sometimes rising several 

 inches above ground, and bearing a crown of numerous fronds. The stipes is short, 

 stout, erect, scaly and often dark-coloured at base, but smooth and green above, or 

 only s'ightly scaly when young. Rachis smooth, green, winged, slightly scaly when 

 young, but smooth afterwards. Fronds usually oval in form, tenderly herbaceous in 

 texture, bright green in colour, and varying from pinnate to tripinnate, according to 

 size, age, and situation. Pinnae numerous (often overlapping) stalked, and divided 

 into oval or lanceolate pinnules, which again are more or less cut or indented at the 

 edges. In the typical plant, the pinnules are cut into rather broad oblong lobes, on 

 the underside of which the sori are placed The sori are short and broad, and when ripe 

 almost cover the under surface of the whole frond. Involucres broad, membranous, 

 white or very pale green, and conspicuous ; opening inwards towards the costse. 

 In the North Island this fern may be identified, in all its forms, by the growth of 

 young plants on the upper surface of its fronds. Sometimes twenty or more of such 

 young plants are seen to be growing on one frond ; and the manner of their production 

 is doubtful, as they seem to occur on all parts of the upper surface indiscriminately, 

 and are often found on fronds of plants, which are too young to produce sori. If the 



