76 The Ferx Lover's Cojipaxiox 



(2) Xet-veixed Chaix Ferx 



Xarrow-leaved Chaix Ferx 



Wdodirardia areolata. II'. angiistifoUa 



Rootstocks creeping and chaffy. Sterile and fertile 

 frond.s unlike; sterile ones nine to twelve inches tall, 

 deltoid-ovate. Broadest at the base, with lanceolate, 

 serrulate divisions united by a broad wing. Veins areo- 

 late; fertile fronds taller, twelve to twenty inches high 

 with narrowly linear divisions, the areoles and fruit-dots 

 in a single row each side of the secondary midrib, the 

 latter sunk in the tissues. 



This species is less common than the Virginia fern, but 

 they often grow near each other. We huve collected both 

 in the Blue Hill reservation near Boston, and both have 

 been found in Hingham, Medford, and Reading, and 

 doubtless in other towns along the coast. Mrs. Parsons 

 speaks of finding them in the flat, sandy country near 

 Buzzard's Bay. The net-veined species has some resem- 

 blance to the sensitive fern, but in the latter the spore 

 cases are shut up in small pods formed by the contracting 

 and rolling up of the lobes, whereas the chain fern bears 

 its sori on the under side of long, narrow pinnse. Besides, 

 the sterile fronds of the latter have serrulate segments. As 

 in the sensitive fern there are many curious gradations 

 between the fertile and sterile fronds, both in shape and 

 fruitfulness. Waters calls them the "obfuxilobala form." 



