Powdery cloak fern

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Powdery cloak fern

Powdery cloak fern

Powdery cloak fern pinnae

Powdery cloak fern

Powdery cloak fern habit

Morphology

Culm

Erect to ascending, wiry, usually unbranched; scales brown, linear, .04 to .16 inch, margins entire.

Leaves

Clustered, numerous; petiole chestnut to dark brown, wiry, lustrous, glabrous; blades green to glaucous, 1.2 to 6 inches, narrowly to broadly deltoid in outline; pinnae long petiolate, in 3-5 pairs, deltoid to ovate; pinnules linear to ovate, .06 to .14 inch, terminal segments slightly larger, occasionally few-lobed, apex obtuse to rounded, margins of fertile pinnules slightly recurved and partially covering sporangia, abaxial surfaces densely white powdery, adaxial surfaces bluish-green, mostly glabrous, veins usually obscure; sporangia in marginal band, usually restricted to distal 1/3 to 1/2 of each vein; indusia absent; spores dark brown, 64 per sporangium.

Ecology

Habitat

Crevices of calcareous or sandstone cliffs and ledges

Distribution

East 1/3 of Kansas

Additional Notes