Kansas Wildflowers and Grasses

MARSH FERN

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Thelypteris palustris Schott var. pubescens (Lawson ) Fernald

Ellsworth County, Kansas

Perennial

Height: 8-40+ inches

Family: Thelypteridaceae - Maiden Fern Family

Flowering Period:

Also Called:

Eastern marsh fern.

Culms:

Stem long-creeping rhizome, slender, to 12 inches long, 1/25 to 1/8 in diameter, branched; scales few, ovate, light brown, appressed.

Leaves:

Somewhat of two forms, lanceolate in outline, divided into distinct segments, each segment further partially divided; stalks slender, 3 to 24 inches, straw-colored, darker at base, glabrous above at maturity; lower surface and mid-veins minutely soft-hairy to nearly glabrous, brownish scales sometimes present; blade 4 to 22 inches long, 2.6 to 8 inches wide; sterile leaves shorter than fertile leaves, divisions somewhat broader; primary divisions nearly opposite or alternate, to 40 pairs, 1 to 4 inches long, .3 to .8 inches wide; tips pointed; division segments ovate to elliptic; margins entire or rarely toothed; tips rounded to pointed; fertile leaves taller, more erect, divisions narrower; primary divisions to 25 pairs, 1 to 4 inches long, .2 to .8 inch wide, tapering to pinnately-divided tip; lower divisions commonly shorter; division segments oblong, entire; sori round, borne on back of division segments, often running together with age and forming line around segment margins; indusium kidney-shaped, tan, without glands, often hairy.

Habitat:

Moist ground; marshes, wet woods and thickets, roadside ditches, stream banks, prairie ravines; sandy soils.

Distribution:

East 1/2 of Kansas.

Origin:

Native

Reproduction:

Ferns are plants that reproduce by spores rather than by true flowers.

Uses:

The Iroquois used the roots as a gynecological aid.

Comments:

Dervived from Greek thelys "female" and pteris "fern". The leaves of marsh fern die back in the winter.