Manual of the New Zealand Flora.

31. Botrychium, Swartz

31. Botrychium, Swartz.

Rhizome short, suberect, emitting numerous long fleshy branching roots. Fronds solitary or rarely two at the top of the rhizome, not circinate, stipitate, thick and fleshy, composed of two divisions: the posterior sterile, pinnate or 2–3-pinnate or decompound; the anterior fertile, of numerous branched spikes forming a pedunculate panicle, the peduncle usually long, inserted on the petiole below the sterile lamina. Sporangia closely packed and sessile in two rows along the branches of the panicle, free, globose, not annulate, dehiscing by a transverse slit; spores numerous, tetrahedral.

Species variously estimated at from 6 to 15, according to the different views of authors. Found in most temperate or extratropical regions, rare in very hot climates. Both the New Zealand species are widely distributed.

Sterile segment of the frond simply pinnate; fertile bipinnate 1. B. lunaria.
Sterile and fertile segments both decompound 2. B. ternatum.
1. B. lunaria, Swartz, Syn. Fil. 171.—Rhizome short, tuberous. Fronds solitary at the top of the rhizome or rarely 2 together, 3–6 in. high; stipes stout, terete, glabrous, with 1 or 2 brownish sheathing scales at the base. Sterile lamina at about the middle of the frond, ¾–3 in. long, ½–1 in. broad, oblong or linear-oblong, rather fleshy, simply pinnate; pinnæ 3–6 pairs, close-set, lunate or flabellate, entire or more or less deeply crenate-toothed. Veins flabellate, radiating from the base. Fertile segment equalling or exceeding the sterile, pedunculate, ½–3 in. long, lanceolate-deltoid, 2-pmnate; the divisions all turned to one side, narrow, thickly covered with the yellowish sporangia. — Hook. f. Fl. Tasm. 154; Hook. and Bak. Syn. Fil. 447; Benth. Fl. Austral. vii. 690; Fnys in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xvi. (1884) 363; Kirk, l.c. 366; Field, N.Z. Ferns, 156, t. 21, f. 8. South Island: Canterbury—South-western slopes of Mount Torlesse, alt.: 2700 ft., J. D. Enys! Not uncommon in the temperate and cool mountainous portions of the Northern Hemisphere, and in Patagonia and Australia in the Southern. The few New Zealand specimens that I have seen are much under the average size of the species in Europe or North America, but I can see no other difference.
2. B. ternatum, Swartz, Syn. Fil. 172.—Rhizome short, stout, emitting numerous long and fleshy almost tuberous roots. Fronds solitary, 6–18 in. long or more. Stipes 1–3 in. long from the rhizome to the forking of the sterile and fertile segments, stout, thick and fleshy, terete. Sterile segment long-peduncled, variable in size, usually from 3–6 in. broad and long, but large specimens sometimes reach 9–12 in., and small ones are often dwarfed to less than 2 in., broadly deltoid, tripartite at the base, the divisions usually petiolate, 2–4-pinnate; the ultimate pinnules oblong or ovate, toothed or crenate or almost entire; texture thick and fleshy. Fertile segment on a stout or slender peduncle 4–12 in. long or more, usually overtopping the sterile segment; panicle 1 ½–6 in. long, nearly as broad at the base, much branched, 3–4-pinnate. Sporangia very numerous.— Hook, and Bak. Syn. Fil. 448; Benth. Fl. Austral. vii. 690; Thoms. N.Z. Ferns, 99; Field, N.Z. Ferns, 157, t. 20, f. 5, 5a. B. virginianum, Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. ii. 50 (not of Swartz). B. cicutarium, Hook. f. Handb. N.Z. Fl. 387 (not of Sivartz). B. australe, R. Br. Prodr. 164; A. Cunn. Precur. n. 160; Raoul, Choix, 37; Prantl, Syst. Ophiogl. 340. Var. dissectum.—Frond more slender; sterile segment much more finely divided, the ultimate pinnules laciniately cut into narrow lobes and teeth.— B. dissectum, Muhl. ex Willd. Sp. Plant, v. 64. B. australe var. millefolium, Prantl, Syst. Ophiogl. 341. B. biforme, Col. in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xviii. (1886) 223. North and South Islands, Chatham Islands: The ordinary form abundant from the North Cape to the south of Otago; var. dissectum often local. Sea-level to 3500 ft. Also in extratropical North America, Asia, and in Australia and Tasmania. Very variable throughout its range, and separated by Prantl and other authorities into 7 or 8 distinct species, the New Zealand forms being placed under B. australe, R. Br.