(à droite photo de celle de la corniche)

(à gauche photo issu du site internet)

Anogramma leptophylla (L.) Link

“Jersey Fern”.

Gymnogramma leptophylla (L.) Desv., Grammitis leptophylla (L.) Sw.).

Sporophyte. Plants very shortly rhizomatous (the plants annual, althouth the prothalli are perennial). The rhizomes when young, bearing scales (with a few narrow scales).

Plants with very different fertile and sterile leaves (the outer, sterile leaves tend to be shorter, are less divided and have broader segments than the inner, fertile leaves). Leaves tufted at the crown (in a few-leaved crown); 3–20 cm long (the outer, sterile ones shorter); dying in the autumn. The petioles shorter than the blade to longer than the blade; vascularised via a single strand. Leaf blades ‘herbaceous’ (but thin). Leaves compound; complexly divided; once pinnate, with conspicuously divided pinnae, or bipinnate with conspicuously divided pinnules to tripinnate with undivided ultimate pinnules (the primary pinnae pinnately lobed to pinnatifid or (in sterile leaves) almost palmatifid, with the ultimate segments themselves lobed). The venation of the lamina open.

The sporangia superficial; initially aggregated in sori. The sori elongated (linear, along the ultimate parts of the veins); becoming confluent when mature; falsely indusiate; with only a false indusium derived exclusively from the lamina margin. Paraphyses absent. The spores trilete; without a perispore.

Distribution and habitat. On damp, shady hedgebanks. Channel Isles: frequent in Jersey, and known from one location in Guernsey.

Classification. C.T.W. family: Polypodiaceae; Swale and Hassler family: Pteridaceae; Stace family: Adiantaceae. Order (Swale and Hassler): Pteridales.