English: Comb ferns; Curlygrass fern.
Clades:
Equisetales;
Equisetidae;
Equisetanae;
Pteridophyta;
Plants.
Members: 3 genera: Actinostachys, Schizaea, Lygodium; ± 65 species.
Regions: Old and New World, Eastern USA, Chile, Falkland Islands, Pacific islands, New Caledonia, Australia, New Zealand, Africa, South Africa; northern hemisphere as late as the Mesozoic, but by the Quaternary, there was a clear shift to a southern hemisphere distribution.
Habitat: tropics, several in temperate regions.
MembersSchizaeaceae: 2 genera, Actinostachys, Schizaea.
Anemiaceae: flowering ferns; 1 genus,
Anemiaceae.
Lygodiaceae: climbing ferns; 1 genus, Lygodium; 40 species; vines.
TaxonomyIn the Ppg1 classification
Schizaeaceae is placed in the order
Schizaeales, together with
Anemiaceae and
Lygodiaceae.
Smith placed
Schizaeales in the leptosporangiate ferns, class
Polypodianae, with three families,
Anemiaceae,
Lygodiaceae, and
Schizaeaceae, in 2006. In 2011 Christenhusz placed
Schizaeales in subclass
Polypodiidae, with the same three families. In 2014 Christenhusz and Chase placed all members of the
Schizaeales in a more broadly defined
Schizaeaceae, reducing the three existing families to subfamilies as Anemioideae, Lygodioideae, and Schizaeoideae, as has been done in the past.
Plant theoryIn the
Plant theory Schizaeaceae is included with
Lygodiaceae and placed as a family in the order
Equisetales.
Schizaeaceae is placed in subphase 7.
Anemiaceae is placed in subphase 7 in Cyatheles.
BotanyIdentification: non-fern-like appearance.
Ferns; small.
Leaves: forking; dimorphic, fertile and sterile fronds; lack well-defined sori.
Sporangia: single-layered with annulus: leptosporangia; annulus horizontal, transverse, lying below and completely encircles the top of the sporangium; subapical opening by longitudinal slit.
Sporangia: with a horizontal annulus that lies below and completely encircles the top of the sporangium. sporangia are borne on specialised pinnae, distinct from ordinary vegetative pinnae; pinnae form small comb-like, pinnate structures on which the sporangia are formed.
Lygodiaceae, or climbing ferns, look very ferny but are highly distinctive in their growth habit: the rachis of the frond is long and flexible, with indeterminate growth, so that the fronds form climbing or trailing vines.
Stages RemediesSchizaeaceae: Actinostachys, Schizaea.
Lygodiaceae: Lygodium; 40 species.
1
Lygodium japonicum15
Actinostachys pennula16
Schizaea bifida17
Schizaea fistulosax
Schizaea dichotoma