Cheilanthes alabamensis (Buckley) Kunze

Alabama lip fern, Smooth lip fern

Etymology Refers to Alabama, where the fern can be found.
Description Rhizome: short-creeping, scales orange, linear, with a brown central stripe near the base.
Frond: 40 cm high by 6 cm wide, deciduous in colder areas, monomorphic, blade/stipe ratio: 2:3.
Stipe: black, rounded above, the color extending into the rachis and costae, a few scales at base, whitish, matted hairs when young, vascular bundles: 1.
Blade: 2-pinnate-pinnatifid at the base, less above, lanceolate, papery, gray-green above, white-waxy below, rachis with tortuous, appressed hairs above, sparse below, lamina appearing glabrous or sparsely hairy above and below.
Pinnae: 15 to 25 pair, ± equilateral; segments segment margins inrolled; margins serrate; veins free, obscure.
Sori: linear, continuous, submarginal, indusium: false, continuous along the margin, sporangia: black.
Culture Habitat: calcareous rock slopes in shade. Distribution: southern United States, northern Mexico, Jamaica. Hardy to -15°C, USDA Zone 7.
Synonyms
Pteris alabamensis Buckley
Pellaea alabamensis (Buckley) Hooker

Cheilanthes alabamensis.In habitat
 Murray Evans
Cheilanthes alabamensis
Cheilanthes alabamensis. Fertile pinna on right.  Illustration by Edgar Paulton, from How to Know the Ferns and Fern Allies, John T. Mickel, © 1979 Wm. C. Brown Co.
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