Vascular Plants of Vermont

The water horsetail (Equisetum fluviatile), also known as the Swamp Horsetail, is a perennial horsetail that commonly grows in dense colonies along freshwater shorelines or in shallow water, growing in ponds, swamps, ditches, and other sluggish or still waters with mud bottoms. It is a herbaceous species, growing 30-100 cm (rarely 140 cm) tall with erect dark green stems 2-8 mm in diameter, smooth, with about 10-30 fine ridges. At each joint, the stem has a... less ↑

Dryopteris /draɪˈɒptərɨs/, commonly called wood fern, male fern (referring in particular to Dryopteris filix-mas), or buckler fern, is a genus of about 250 species of ferns with distribution in the temperate Northern Hemisphere, with the highest species diversity in eastern Asia. Many of the species have stout, slowly creeping rootstocks that form a crown, with a vase-like ring of fronds. The sori are round, with a peltate indusium. The stipes have prominent scales. less ↑

Equisetum arvense, the field horsetail or common horsetail, is a herbaceous perennial plant, native throughout the arctic and temperate regions of the northern hemisphere. It has separate sterile non-reproductive and fertile spore-bearing stems, growing from a perennial underground rhizomatous stem system. The fertile stems are produced in early spring and are non-photosynthetic, while the green sterile stems start to grow after the fertile stems have wilted, and persist through the summer until the first autumn frosts. less ↑

Dryopteris marginalis is known as the marginal shield fern or marginal wood fern. The marginal wood fern favors damp shady areas and is found throughout eastern North America. It favors moderately acid to circumneutral soils. It favors cooler areas, but is fairly drought-resistant once established. In the warmer parts of its range, it is most likely to be found on north-facing non-calcareous rock faces. less ↑

Cystopteris fragilis is a species of fern known by the common names brittle bladderfern and common fragile fern. It can be found worldwide, generally in shady, moist areas. The leaves are up to 30 or 40 centimeters long and are borne on fleshy petioles. Each leaf is divided into many pairs of leaflets, each of which is subdivided into lobed segments. The underside of the leaf has many rounded sori containing the sporangia. less ↑

Botrychium ascendens is a species of fern known by the common names triangle-lobe moonwort and upswept moonwort. It is native to North America from British Columbia to northern California as well as parts of eastern Canada. It lives in different habitat types, including grassy riverside areas. This is very small plant growing from an underground caudex and sending one yellow-green leaf above the surface of the ground. The leaf is up to 6 centimeters tall and... less ↑

Botrychium minganense is a species of fern known by the common name Mingan moonwort. It is native to North America from Alaska and northern Canada to Arizona, where it is uncommon throughout most of its range, appearing at scattered spots in coniferous forests and marshy areas such as swamps. This is very small plant growing from an underground caudex and sending one thin leaf above the surface of the ground. The leaf is up to 10... less ↑

Dryopteris filix-mas (male fern) is a common fern of the temperate Northern Hemisphere, native to much of Europe, Asia, and North America. It favours damp shaded areas in the understory of woodlands, but also shady places on hedge-banks, rocks, and screes. It is much less abundant in North America than in Europe. The plant is sometimes referred to in ancient literature as worm fern. less ↑

Sceptridium multifidum is a fern species in the Ophioglossaceae (Adder's tongue family), known by the common names leathery grapefern and leathery moonwort. It is native to Europe, Asia, and North America, where it is widespread and grows in moist areas in many habitat types. This is a fleshy, leathery plant growing from a small caudex with thin, corky roots. It produces a single leaf which emerges directly from the ground. It is divided into a sterile... less ↑

Sceptridium dissectum is a common fern (or fern-ally) in the family Ophioglossaceae, occurring in eastern North America. Like other plants in this group, it normally only sends up one frond per year. It has long been the subject of confusion because the frond presents in one of two forms, either the normal form (forma obliquum) that resembles other plants in the genus, or the skeletonized form (forma dissectum). less ↑

Cystopteris bulbifera (bulblet bladderfern) is a low-growing rock fern with creeping stems and narrow elongate deltate fronds which grow to 75 cm (30 in), native to eastern North America with two disjunct populations in the west. It is found only on calcareous substrates such as limestone. It commonly festoons limestone cave openings. While most commonly found on vertical rock faces, it also grows in rocky scree. C. bulbifera is unusual among ferns in producing bulblets along... less ↑

Matteuccia struthiopteris (common names ostrich fern or shuttlecock fern) is a crown-forming, colony-forming fern, occurring in temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere in eastern and northern Europe, northern Asia and northern North America. The species epithet struthiopteris comes from Ancient Greek words, struthio meaning ostrich and pterion meaning wing. less ↑

Matteuccia struthiopteris (common names ostrich fern or shuttlecock fern) is a crown-forming, colony-forming fern, occurring in temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere in eastern and northern Europe, northern Asia and northern North America. The species epithet struthiopteris comes from Ancient Greek words, struthio meaning ostrich and pterion meaning wing. less ↑

Onoclea sensibilis, the sensitive fern, also known as the bead fern, is a coarse-textured, medium to large-sized deciduous perennial fern. The name comes from the observation by early American settlers that it was very sensitive to frost, the fronds dying quickly when first touched by it. It is sometimes treated as the only species in Onoclea, but some authors do not consider the genus monotypic. less ↑

Asplenium ruta-muraria is a species of fern commonly known as wall-rue. In Germany, it is known as Mauerraute or Mauerstreifenfarn. It is a very small epipetric species, growing exclusively on limestone and other calcareous rocks. It is native to both Europe and eastern North America. In Europe, it commonly invades masonry and is a common species, while in the United States, it is more difficult to find, favoring pockets in very well-weathered and rather dry limestone... less ↑

Woodwardia virginica (Virginia chain fern, Woodwardie de virginie) is a leptosporangiate fern with long creeping, scaly, underground stems or rhizomes which give rise to tall (up to about 4 feet, 120 centimetres) widely separated, deciduous, single leaves. In contrast, the leaves of Osmundastrum cinnamomeum, which can be mistaken for W. virginica, grow in a group from a crown. Also in contrast to O. cinnamomeum the leaves are monomorphic without distinct fertile fronds. The lower petiole or stipe is... less ↑

Asplenium montanum, commonly known as the mountain spleenwort, is a small fern of the Appalachian Mountains. First described in 1810, it grows in small crevices in sandstone cliffs with highly acid soil. It can be recognized by its dark blue-green, highly divided leaves. A. montanum is the ancestor, through hybridization, of several other ferns of similar habitat. less ↑

Asplenium platyneuron (syn. Asplenium ebeneum), commonly known as ebony spleenwort or brownstem spleenwort, is a fern native to North America east of the Rocky Mountains and to South Africa. It takes its common name from its dark, reddish-brown, glossy stipe and rachis (stem and leaf axis), which bear a once-divided, pinnate leaf. The fertile fronds, which die off in the winter, are darker green and stand upright, while the sterile fronds are evergreen and lie flat... less ↑

Thelypteris noveboracensis, or the New York fern, is a fern found throughout the eastern United States and Canada. It is distinctive by its pinnae tapering to the base of the frond, and by its forming extensive clonal colonies on ridgetops and mountain benches. The only other native species in this area with similarly tapering pinnae is the ostrich fern, Matteuccia struthiopteris, which generally grows in riparian habitats. The only other species that forms as extensive clonal... less ↑

Pellaea glabella is the smooth cliffbrake. For much of pteridological history, it was regarded as a reduced form or variety of Pellaea atropurpurea. P. glabella is known to exist in two cryptic species, one diploid and one tetraploid. The diploid reproduces sexually, while the tetraploid is normally apogamous. It is now known that the tetraploid form of the species is one of the parents of the original hybrid P. Xatropurpurea that became the apogamous species. less ↑

Adiantum viridimontanum, commonly known as Green Mountain maidenhair fern, is a rare fern found only in outcrops of serpentine rock in New England and Eastern Canada. The leaf blade is cut into finger-like segments, themselves once-divided, which are borne on the outer side of a curved, dark, glossy rachis (the central stalk of the leaf). These finger-like segments are not individual leaves, but parts of a single compound leaf. The "fingers" may be drooping or erect,... less ↑

Asplenium × ebenoides (Scott's spleenwort, dragon tail fern or walking spleenwort) is a hybrid fern native to eastern North America, part of the "Appalachian Asplenium complex" of related hybrids. The sterile offspring of the walking fern (A. rhizophyllum) and the ebony spleenwort (A. platyneuron), A. × ebenoides is intermediate in morphology between its two parents, combining the long, narrow blade of A. rhizophyllum with a dark stem and lobes or pinnae similar to those of A. platyneuron. While A. × ebenoides is generally sterile, fertile... less ↑