Garden question: Staghorn 'spores'?

[kambuckta]

I've got a little Staghorn fern that I propogated from a monster (about 5' wide) that I had in my garden at my last house. This one I have mounted on a backboard, and it has three individual ferns that are healthy and showing new growth including some new 'babies' sprouting forth as clumps as well.

My question is that some of the older leaves are semi-covered with a rust-coloured 'felt'. It doesn't look like an invasive fungal growth, and doesn't seem to affect the health of the plant itself. It's quite contained on only some of the older fronds, and covers a particular area of the leaf....almost like it's meant to be there if you get what I mean.

IOW, does the Staghorn fern also shoot spores to propogate itself rather than just by clumping?

[Cicero]

Are you taliking a staghorn or an alkhorn here? Elkhorns tend to sprout themselves- staghorns are more difficult in the spores form under the leaves (botanists correct me). Either way I have had both for years with the spores and no worries.

[kambuckta]

Originally Posted by Cicero

Are you taliking a staghorn or an alkhorn here? Elkhorns tend to sprout themselves- staghorns are more difficult in the spores form under the leaves (botanists correct me). Either way I have had both for years with the spores and no worries.

Actually, I'm not sure which deer it is! I got the original plant as an orphan dumped down the back lane behind my house. It was massive even then, so I dragged it and bunged it on a coir slab in my garden and the bugger just thrived on neglect. When I moved, I couldn't move IT, so I sliced some of the individual plantlets off and stuck them on a board under the eaves.......the rest you know.

I'm not worried about the velvety spores as such, just wondering whether the fern has two different propogating methods really.....clumping and spore-drop.

[Cicero]

If it is like antlers- as in a lot of "fronds - it is likely to be an elkhorn. If it is like a big egg cup with layers of increasingingly large leaves (similar to a lettuce) would be a staghorn.

[CannyDan]

Staghorn or elkhorn, both can reproduce vegetatively by producing root suckers-- those "plantlets" you cut off.

Both also reproduce sexually, and spores are a part of that sexual cycle. But spores are not seeds. Briefly (since you didn't really ask for the gory details) a seed grows into another plant like the one that produced the seed. But a fern spore grows into a completely different plant, usually quite small and nondescript, called the gametophyte. This plant produces a "seed" (actually a zygote) that grows into a plant like the original spore-producer. Hence ferns are said to have an "alternation of generations".

The spores under your leaves are no danger-- but unless you provide some rather specific conditions, they are unlikely to result in any new plants.

[justrob]

This UF page has a pic of the Staghorn with spores.

http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/MG015

[kambuckta]

Originally Posted by justrob

This UF page has a pic of the Staghorn with spores.

http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/MG015

Thank you justrob. That picture of the sporangia stuff is exactly what I'm talking about, plus the 'pups' as described.

Cheers everyone!