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Key to Pteridaceae
https://fsus.ncbg.unc.edu/main.php?pg=show-key.php&keyid=39402
3 Sori continuous along the pinnule margins (or across the blade in Acrostichum); leaves mostly dark-green or glaucous, often pubescent, coriaceous, tough, and stiff (except Ceratopteris). | |
6 Leaves essentially monomorphic. | |
7 Petioles with alternating longitudinal grooves (2 or 3) and ridges on the upper surface; [subfamily Pteridoideae]. | |
8 Lower surface of leaf blades with white or yellow farina; sporangia along the veins, not covered by the reflexed leaf margin; [of peninsular FL in our region] | |
8 Lower surface of leaf blades lacking farina; sporangia submarginal, typically covered by the reflexed leaf margin; [widespread in our region] | |
9 Leaves 1-pinnate-pinnatifid or more divided (to 5-pinnate); lower leaf blade surfaces glabrous to pubescent and/or farinose; petiole with 1 vascular bundle. | |
11 Leaf blade deltoid; white farina on lower blade surface not interspersed with shiny, dark-brown needle-like hairs; [of KY westwards] | |
11 Leaf blade lanceolate; white farina on lower blade surface interspersed with shiny, dark-brown needle-like hairs; [of s. TX only in our region] | |
13 Leaves 2-5-pinnate, the ultimate leaf-segments 1-4 (-8) mm long, more-or-less densely hairy (glabrous or glabrescent in Myriopteris alabamensis and M. microphylla). | |
Key A4: small ‘fern-like’ pteridophytes, epipetric or epiphytic, growing on rock, tree bark, or walls
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https://fsus.ncbg.unc.edu/main.php?pg=show-key.php&keyid=40695
1 Leaves pinnatifid or bipinnatifid, the pinnae not fully divided from one another (the rachis winged by leaf tissue most or all of its length). | |
4 Leaves of an herbaceous, subcoriaceous, or coriaceous texture, > 1 cell thick; sori otherwise; [various habitats, not strictly of moist sites]. | |
5 Leaf blades > 7 cm long, glabrescent or hairy with hairs < 1 mm long. | |
8 Leaves of an herbaceous, subcoriaceous, or coriaceous texture, > 1 cell thick; sori otherwise or sporangia not grouped in sori; [various habitats, not strictly of moist sites]. | |
10 Sporangia borne on the lower surface of green leaves; [collectively widespread] | |
11 Veins anastamosing (rejoining one another) to form a netlike pattern of areoles. | |
12 Costae rounded or flat on the upper side, with red, multicellular hairs; margins of segments entire or with rounded lobes | |
13 Sori on the undersurface of the leaf, marginal and more-or-less hidden beneath either the unmodified revolute leaf margin or under a modified, reflexed false indusium | |
7 Leaves bipinnate or more divided. | |
14 Leaf blade pentagonal, broadly triangular, or narrowly triangular in outline, ca. 1-2.5× as long as wide. | |
15 Leaf blade either ovate, pentagonal, or broadly triangular in outline, mostly 0.8-2× as long as wide. | |
17 Leaves monomorphic. | |
19 Leaf blade pentagonal in outline, the terminal pinna by far the largest; rhizome 5-8 mm in diameter; indusia present, thick, persistent, and reniform; [introduced species, rarely naturalized] | |
14 Leaf blade elongate, mostly lanceolate, generally > 4× as long as wide (except in Adiantum, with leaf blade often only 1.5-3× as long as wide, but not notably triangular or pentagonal in outline). | |
22 Veins ending short of the margin; indusium attached under the sorus, either cup-like (divided into 3-6 lanceolate to ovate lobes which surround the sorus from below) or of minute numerous septate hairs, which extend out from under the sorus on all sides; petioles often densely beset with scales, the petiole bases persistent |