FERNS OF NORTH-CENTRAL ONTARIO. 
2 99 
The holly fern (Polystichum lonchitis) might perhaps be 
termed the characteristic fern of this territory. Beside occurring 
wherever the hart’s tongue does it is also found in some places 
where the latter is absent. In many places it was present in great 
abundance, always growing in shade in crevices (usually at the 
top, but often some three feet down) in limestone ridges or in 
hollows in limestone boulders. It is a most beautiful species, 
combining as it does a delicacy of outline with a firmness of 
frond. Some fronds reached a length of twenty inches, but the 
average length was ten inches. 
The prothallia are found principally some distance down 
crevices where the air is moist. The first fronds are two-lobed, 
from two to three lines long and very thin and membranaceous. 
Between this infantile stage and the adult form of frond are to 
be found fronds with two or three rather large (for the size of 
the plant) pinnae with blunt-crenate margins, then fronds which 
resemble the green spleenwort (Asplenium viride) in texture and 
form, after which stage they become spinulose-toothed and begin 
to assume the firm texture of the fronds of the adult plant. The 
spinulose teeth begin to show in some fronds when one and one- 
quarter inches in length, while others one and three-quarter inches 
long still resemble the green spleenwort. The leathery texture 
becomes manifest in fronds about two inches long and when the 
plants bear fronds three and one-half inches long some of them 
begin to bear fruit-dots. 
While there is some variation in the cutting of the adult fronds 
I only found one frond, and that a small one, in which the cutting 
was widely different from type. In this case the spiny teeth 
on each pinna were very few (only four to ten to the pinna) and 
the pinnae from just below the middle of the frond were cleft 
very irregularly and nearly to the midrib. 
Another fern of this reigon is interesting because its only sta¬ 
tion, besides a small station at Niagara Falls, is in the north- 
central part of the province. This is the Male Fern (Nephrodium 
filix-mas ). The first station reported in Canada was Owen 
Sound. While I did not see it in the vicinity of Owen Sound, 
I found it on McLean’s Mountain near Kemble, thirteen miles 
