The list of what ferns will not do is more noteworthy than the list of what they will do. They do not bloom with colorful or fragrant flowers. The do not produce fruit. Very few turn color in autumn, and their color is generally nothing to brag about. Most ferns will not maintain their appeal through drought, or if neglected too long. Nor will they tolerate heat and wind, especially in full sun exposure.
Yet ferns are still popular for what they ‘will’ do. They provide remarkably distinctive and stylish foliage. They survive in spots that are too shady or perhaps too damp for other plants. Ferns will be quite happy in pots or planters, and some are happy to grow as houseplants. Ferns somehow avoid getting eaten by deer. If a fern gets tasted by a deer who does not know better, it will survive.
All ferns are perennial. Most are evergreen. Their foliage arches upward and outward from the terminal buds of stout rhizomes. Some ferns develop dense foliar rosettes. A few develop trunks by growing vertically instead of horizontally, and dispersing roots downward through their own decomposing fibrous rhizomes. Many ferns will get quite broad. Many are quite delicate and diminutive.
Ferns may not require too much maintenance, but the little bit of maintenance they require is somewhat important to keep them looking tidy. Old foliage should be pruned away as it is replaced by new foliage. This may be as simple as pruning away all old foliage just after new foliage develops early in spring. For some ferns, small batches of old foliage might get removed through the year.
The foliage of ferns is comprised of leaves known as ‘fronds’. With few exceptions, the fronds of ferns are intricately lobed or divided into smaller leaflets known as ‘pinnae’. (‘Pinna’ is singular for pinnae.) These pinnae are arranged on opposite sides of fibrous leafstalks known as ‘rachi’. (‘Rachis’ is singular for rachi.) Rachi are quite fibrous and tough, so should be cut close to the ground with pruning shears when they get groomed, rather than plucked.
How Italian! Red, white and green! A coastal redwood with a white albino sport (mutant growth) amongst otherwise deep green foliage. Actually, it is very Californian. Coastal redwood is endemic to California with only a a few north of the border on the extreme southern coast of Oregon.
Severe summer weather is something that we think that we do not need to contend with. It only rarely gets as unbearably hot here as it does elsewhere, and when it does, it usually gets breezy by evening, and somewhat cooler overnight. Aridity, or the lack of humidity, is another advantage, at least for us. The plants in our gardens are affected by warm weather very differently than we are.
That refers to the pattern of the veins in the leaves. Long before studying horticulture and botany at Cal Poly, my classmates and I learned a bit about horticulture within the contexts of studying ‘nature’. While in the sixth grade, we all went to camp for a week. One of the many projects we did during that time was collecting a few leaves to represent three different vein patterns, and mounting them under clear plastic on a cardboard plaque. The three different patters were, ‘pinnate’, ‘palmate’, and ‘parallel’. I do not remember if we all used the same leaves, but for my plaque, I got a blue gum eucalyptus leaf to represent pinnate veins. Palmate veins were represented by English ivy. Parallel veins were represented by English plantain.
Staghorn ferns are epiphytes. They cling to tree trunks, rocks or whatever they happen to grab onto. They can root into decayed wood if it is porous enough, but they are satisfied to just cling to the exterior. They do not need soil. They sort of make their own soil by collecting debris that falls from the canopies of trees above. In the jungles where they live, they get all the water they need from rain. They often live in the crotches of branches because that is where they happen to land. (The epiphyte I wrote about earlier was just a palm that landed in the wrong place, but is not really an epiphyte. 
Only a few bits and pieces of natural native vegetation can be found on the floor of the Santa Clara Valley. They are primarily in spots that were not useful for some sort of development. Almost all of the big coast live oaks and valley oaks that lived in the flat areas are gone. Riparian vegetation still survives on the banks of creeks, and in adjacent areas where it has not yet been cleared.
I do not know where they went. There are plenty that are not worth getting pictures of, but the pretty and colorful ones that I wanted to show off in the ‘Six on Saturday’ post are gone. I suppose that they are still out there. They just are not as pretty and colorful as they were earlier.
This single yellow ginkgo leaf says a lot. It was found among the abundant cottonwood leaves on the broad walkway in Felton Covered Bridge Park (
After reading so much about the exquisite foliar color that most everyone else in the Northern Hemisphere gets this time of year, I must admit, I can get rather envious of those who experience four seasons instead of just two. The abundance of spring in the Southern Hemisphere does not help. Why have I not found a garden blog from Ecuador or Indonesia so that I have something to point and laugh at? It just isn’t fair.
Tony Tomeo 