Who doesn’t have a fern in their home? They are easy to care for, hardy and lush so they help when adding green to the garden.
Few people know that Ferns they belong to genus Asplenium and that it includes a large number of species, some more popular than others adding a total of 7.000 species.
The mystery of the fern
The ferns are from the Polypodiaceae family and they can look very different although they all share certain characteristics: they do not have flowers, fruits or seeds. For these reasons, for many years botanists could not discover how they multiplied.
But in 1850 a German discovered that at the bottom of the leaves are the spores that allow multiplication.
Most popular ferns
One of the the most popular fern is Asplenium adiantum nigrumwhich is distinguished by its pennate leaves in which a long reddish petiole is observed.
Another variety is the Asplenium’s nestquite different from the previous one because it has large bright green leaves, each with an important central vein.
The Asplenium bulbiferum It is a fern native to Australia and New Zealand. It is characterized by having widely separated fronds on the margins of which small bulbs appear, which are responsible for the growth of new seedlings.
Finally, there is the Asplenium viviparum which is native to the Mauritius Islands and also has widely separated fronds.
