[Asplenium trichomanes (Maidenhair spleenwort)
& Asplenium ebeneum or Asplenium platyneuron (Ebony Spleenwort)]
I would make a chart of our life,
know why just this circle of creatures completes the world.
Henry Thoreau, April 18, 1852
I go along under the east side of Lee's Cliff, looking at the evergreen ferns . . .
How pretty the smallest asplenium sometimes, in a recess under a shelving rock,
as it were pinned on rosettewise, as if it were the head of a breastpin.
November 18, 1858
Almost every plant, however humble, has thus its day,
and sooner or later becomes the characteristic feature
of some part of the landscape or other.
September 10, 1860
 |
| Rock Polypody & Maidenhair spleenwort (Polypodium vulgare & AspidiumTrichomanes,) September, 2018 |
September 30. Of the twenty-three ferns which I seem to know here, seven may be called evergreens. September 30, 1859
November 17. As for the evergreen ferns, I see now —Common polypody (though shrivelled by cold where exposed). Asplenium trichomanes. A. ebeneum. Aspidium spinulosum (?) large frond, small-fruited, in swamp southeast Brister’s Spring, on 16th. A. cristatum (?), Grackle Swamp on the 15th, with oftener what I take to be the narrower and more open sterile frond. A. marginale (common). A. achrostichoides (terminal shield) November 17, 1858
February 2. We stop awhile under Bittern Cliff, the south side, where it is very warm. There are a few greenish radical leaves to be seen, — primrose and johnswort, strawberry, etc., and spleenwort still green in the clefts. February 2, 1854
April 6. Asplenium ferns of both species are very generally perfectly withered and shrivelled. April 6, 1858
July 17. I find to-day, at Bittern Cliff and at Lee's, Asplenium ebeneum (the larger), apparently nearly in prime, and A. Trichomanes, apparently just begun. This very commonly occurs in tufts at the base of the last, like radical leaves to it. July 17, 1857
August 30. The dwarf spleenwort grows in the sharp angles of the rocks in the side of Lee's Cliff, its small fronds spreading in curved rays, its matted roots coming away in triangular masses, moulded by the rock. The ebony spleenwort stands upright against the rocks. August 30, 1853
October 28. Both aspleniums and the small botrychium are still fresh, as if they were evergreen. The latter sheds pollen. The former are most fresh under the shelter of rocks. October 28, 1857
November 18. I go along under the east side of Lee’s Cliff, looking at the evergreen ferns. The marginal fern is the commonest. How pretty the smallest asplenium sometimes, in a recess under a shelving rock, as it were pinned on rosettewise, as if it were the head of a breastpin. November 18, 1858
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Evergreen Ferns, Part One: Maidenhair and Ebony Spleenwort
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau
"A book, each page written in its own season,
out-of-doors, in its own locality."
~edited, assembled and rewritten by zphx © 2009-2024
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