Ah Jen, my darlin' little fountain of good information, lol, I knew I could count on you! Thanks so much for a beautiful explanation, I'd love to know not only where you find the time to learn this stuff but also how you find the time to maintain that fabulous collection, be so generous here and still have anything like a real life. It could be staghorn gametophytes(gotta use this somewhere, use it or lose it, you know, lol), but who knows? My cinnamon ferns and royal ferns don't seem very aggressive(I've heard that they can be but never seen them reproduce even one new plant), the only "wild" fern that spreads around close by has gametophytes(see? I really do need to use these words or I'll never remember them, that's the kind of girl I am) that are very different looking, deep dark green and kind of "carpet-like", I'll post a couple of pictures, one of the fronds and one of the gametophytes(!) and see if you know what it is. There aren't any live oaks nearby with the resurrection ferns in them so I don't think it's that. I guess I won't ask for any cultural tips, this old monster is almost too big to move around much anymore and it has a white butterfly ginger growing out the side that's been there for a couple of years, poor thing, I thought I liberated it last spring but it's ba-a-a-a-ack! Thanks again, Jen, you're a Minnesota peach.

Hallo poaky. I noticed that the images I had uploaded have disappeared due to the updating of Flickr and I can not highlight them. Sorry. It amazes me the information that the hart tongue fern live only 2 or 3 years. My have many more, and each year they get bigger and lush. Sometimes dies the oldest part of the strain but continue to develop various side shoots. The reproduction of ferns in nature is a very rare event compared to the millions of spores that are produced. But it is rightly so, if they survived only 1% in the space of a decade in the world exist only ferns. Although the conditions of light and humidity are favorable and born many prothalli immediately they become food for a multitude of other living things, from bacteria to snails, from mushrooms to caterpillars of butterflies. The prothalli survivors must continue to have constant temperature, humidity and light adequate. If at the time of maturity they are not wet by a veil of water, antherozoids fail to swim until the archegonium for creates a sporophyte. And if they are not eaten before, degenerate and die later. For us humans who do not have long lead times and spaces of nature, which in a few months we want to see our garden covered with flowers, we just have to intervene by creating artificial conditions. Keep the light, humidity and temperature constant, hold off predators who want to eat our precious prothalli under a tree in the garden is a losing battle. Re-create the right environment in a small container closed and transparent is much easier and is the system used by those who want to obtain new ferns in a secure manner to success. For those who do not have the mentality of the professor Oldbones, mythical character of Mickey Mouse, the reproduction of ferns from spores is very boring, it's like watching the stalactites as they become longer, better buy a beautiful fern to be planted in the garden. If your fern in the garden is dead after a few years depends on how much calcium there is in the soil, my growing up on a layer of pine needles decomposed between lilies of the valley and ivy. Is probably dead for water stress. The ferns are not only sensitive to moisture in the soil but also to the air, if the air is dry and even worse if there is often wind leaves lose too much water through transpiration. In this case, you can create a kind of protection built at some distance a pretty drywall stone that protects from the prevailing winds. The wall can be of various heights and with steps to support the pots with plants that love the shade. In this way also carries a decorative function My best wishes for the new fern.

+I was thinking of the little so-called walking fern, camptosorus rhizopyllus with heart shaped frond and long trailing tip. I found some online last spring from, I think, Tennessee, but they didn't handle spring and summer heat as well as I had hoped, I doubt they survived, I wish I had kept one indoors as a house fern. I was thinking I might have done better to grow from spores if they were available. Yes, LAIFS does have old spores, I've only had one failure from them, though. Their biggest drawback is that it takes forever for them to cash a check in payment. . . .

I see that Imageshack has been fixed so that you can log in again, so now I can post pics of that fern. Here is a close-up of the end of one of the uncurling fiddleheads: The previous pic had more accurate color balance, but here is the end of a mature leaf: And here are the beginnings of leaves on the prothalli. Again, these are the same color as the rest of the fern: The fern is approx. 3 inches tall,3 inches wide, and the leaves are about 3 1/2" long. When I found it, it was growing on a slight hill, partially under a rock, in fairly dry conditions (there were prickly pear and barrel cacti on the same hill). When I was just looking at it to determine size, a few more questions came up. First, should I cut off the dead leaves (since I got it, it has had the old leaves die off and new leaves replace them)? Second, why on earth doesn't it have any spore cases on these leaves??? I was examining the leaves and saw that none of them have spore cases. When I first got this fern, I could easily see spore cases on the underside of the leaves, but now I can't, even on the fairly new leaves. Would this be because of the difference of climates between where it was and where it is now? Any ideas? Thanks, -Jmcat