SCHIZAEA PUSILLA AT HOME. 



Anyone who has seen this odd fern growing in its 

 native haunts will probably concur in the opinion held 

 by some, that while it is looked upon as one of the rar- 

 est of ferns its small size and its habit of growing in the 

 midst of other low plants have no doubt caused it to be 

 passed over by collectors in many regions wdiere it 

 really exists. This should be an encouragement to col- 

 lectors to keep the fern in mind in their field excursions 

 with a view to adding new stations for it to those now 

 known. The finding of a rare plant in a new locality 

 is always a source of especial pleasure to the discoverer, 

 aside from being an item of value to the botanist in 

 general. 



Schizaca pusilla was first collected early in this 

 century at Quaker Bridge, N. J. about thirty-five miles 

 east of Philadelphia. The spot is a desolate looking 

 place in the wildest of the "pine barrens" where a 

 branch of the Atsion river flows through marshy low- 

 lands and cedar swamps. Here amid sedge grasses, 

 mosses, Lycopodiums, Droseras and wild cranberry 

 vines the little treasure has been collected. But though 

 I have hunted for it more than once my eyes have never 

 been sharp enough to detect its fronds in this locality. 



In October of last year, however, a good friend 

 guided me to another place in New Jersey where he 

 knew it to be growing and there we found it. It was 

 a small open spot in the pine barrens, low and damp. 

 In the white sand grew patches of low grasses, mosses, 

 Lycopodium Carolinianum y L. inimdatum and Pyxidan- 

 thera barbata, besides several small ericaceous plants 

 and some larger shrubs, such as scrub oaks, sumacs 

 etc. Close by was a little stream and just beyond that 

 a bog. Although we knew that Schizaea grew within 

 a few feet of the path in which we stood, it required the 



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