
BRITISH FERNS 

Fig. 256. Рети афийана (part of pinna). 
being rolled back so as to form an indusium, or protecting cover. 
P. aquilina has a fleshy, travelling, underground rootstock, which 
sometimes penetrates very deeply into the soil, and produces its 
fronds at a considerable distance from each other. Аз a result 
of this, it is all but impossible to remove a plant successfully in the 
growing season, and the only way is to lift it in the winter, by 
digging up a good mass of soil pervaded by these rootstocks, and 
without disturbing them by breaking the mass, drop the latter 
en bloc into a peaty station provided where a plant is desired. 
The spores, however, germinate very freely, and the resulting plants 
rapidly assume a good size, so that where valuable varieties are 
concerned they are easily propagated in this way. Curiously enough, 
however, despite its reputed hardiness, and wide distribution as a 
hardy plant, in the seedling state hard frost is often fatal, especially 
if the youngsters have been raised under glass. We have been 
successful in raising very fine varieties from spores in small pans, 
and transferring them to the garden by sinking the pans containing 
young plants with five or six inch long fronds, into prepared peaty 
stations in the late summer, at a depth permitting a mulch of about 
two or three inches of similar soil. The travelling rootstocks will 
then climb over the pan edges, and plunge into the adjacent soil 
sufficiently deep to be safe during the winter, and the following 
season they will establish themselves so strongly as to commence 
to exercise their usual monopolizing tendency at the expense of 
the plants in the vicinity. We have seen splendid specimens 
grown in sunken tubs, which have been adopted to check such 
invasions. Obviously, indoor culture for so robust a Fern is a 
mistake, nor should it be installed outside unless there is ample 
room for it to spread. An exception to this remark is P. aq. congesta, 
which see. The most marked varieties are :— 
CONGESTA.—A very beautiful, densely congested form, which 
grows about two feet high and travels very slowly; is adapted, 
therefore, for pan culture; a gem. | 
CRISPA.—This thick, dark green, leathery, crispy form is, as we 
have said above, not uncommon in association with the normal j 
it is very pretty. 








