Crossword clues for lygodium
lygodium
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Lygodium \Ly*go"di*um\, n. [NL., fr. Gr. ? flexible; ? a willow twig + e'i^dos form.] (Bot.) A genus of ferns with twining or climbing fronds, bearing stalked and variously-lobed divisions in pairs.
Note: Lygodium palmatum, much prized for indoor ornament, inhabits shaded and moist grassy places, from Massachusetts to Virginia and Kentucky, and sparingly southwards.
Wikipedia
Lygodium (climbing fern) is a genus of about 40 species of ferns, native to tropical regions across the world, with a few temperate species in eastern Asia and eastern North America. It is the sole genus in the family Lygodiaceae, though included in the family Schizaeaceae by some botanists.
They are unusual in that the rachis, or midrib, of the frond is thin, flexible, and long, the frond unrolling with indeterminate growth and the rachis twining around supports, so that each frond forms a distinct vine. The fronds may be from long, depending on the species.
Some Lygodium species are now considered very problematic invasive weeds in the southeastern United States. Populations of Lygodium have increased more than 12-fold over the past decade, as noted by Florida's Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences.
Japanese climbing fern ( Lygodium japonicum) was added to the Florida Noxious Weed List in 1999. It is also a major problem in pine plantations, causing contamination and harvesting problems for the pine straw industry. Old World climbing fern ( Lygodium microphyllum) infests cypress swamps and other hydric sites, forming a monoculture. This massive infestation displaces all native flora and fauna, completely changing the ecosystem of the area.
Plants in this genus have basal chromosome counts of n=28, 29, 30.
Usage examples of "lygodium".
And lower down the great forest trees arch over it, and the sunbeams trickle through them, and dance in many a quiet pool, turning the far-down sands to gold, brightening majestic tree-ferns, and shining on the fragile polypodium tamariscinum which clings tremblingly to the branches of the graceful waringhan, on a beautiful lygodium which adorns the uncouth trunk of an artocarpus, on glossy ginger-worts and trailing yams, on climbers and epiphytes, and on gigantic lianas which, climbing to the tops of the tallest trees, descend in vast festoons, many of them with orange and scarlet flowers and fruitage, passing from tree to tree, and interlacing the forest with a living network, while selaginellas and lindsayas, and film ferns, and trichomanes radicans drape the rocks in feathery green, along with mosses scarcely distinguishable from ferns.