General: Deciduous perennial arising in clusters from a short, creeping rhizome.
Leaves: Thin, broadly lanceolate or egg-shaped, 5-45 cm long, 3-10 cm wide, smooth, seldom finely glandular, 2- to 3-pinnate, ultimate segments fan-like, toothed towards the tips.
Notes: A variable species, which in this concept includes both plants with spiny spores (C. fragilis sensu stricto) and those with warty spores. Plants with warty spores were segregated in Europe as C. dickieana. Ceska & Ceska (unpubl.) found that our populations with warty spores are not uniform in other characters and agree with C. Haufler that "some of the American material ... may not be conspecific with material from the type locality of C. dickieana." (Lellinger 1985, p. 260).
Dry to moist rocks, talus slopes, crevices, ledges, and forest margins from the lowland and steppe to alpine zones; common throughout BC; cosmopolitan, N to AK, YT and NT, E to NF, and S to ME, NH, PA, NC, IL, KS, NM, AZ and CA; Eurasia, Africa, New Zealand, Australia, S America, Antarctic Islands.
The table below shows the species-specific information calculated from original data (BEC database) provided by the BC Ministry of Forests and Range. (Updated August, 2013)
A shade-tolerant/intolerant, submontane to alpine, cosmopolitan fern (transcontinental in North America). Occurs on fresh to very moist, nitrogen-medium soils within tundra, boreal, temperate, and mesothermal climates. Rare to sporadic in non-forested communities and semi-open forests on water-shedding or water-receiving sites. Characteristic of colluvial sites.
