Rainforest Fern Leaves

• Some ferns are adapted to the dim light of rainforests.David De Lossy/Digital Vision/Getty Images
  
  The leaves of some ferns can conduct photosynthesis in dim light, necessary for them to survive in dark rainforests. Ferns have compounded, pinnate leaves on fronds, meaning that they have many slender leaves growing from both sides of a stem. The total surface area of a fern’s numerous leaves is usually greater than that of the fewer, but larger leaves on most seed-bearing plants. This feature enables ferns to conduct photosynthesis in shaded environments. Fern leaves often have soft hair or fuzz on the leaves’ bottoms trapping dew, humid air and rain.
  
  

Desert Fern Leaves

• Some ferns are adapted to conditions of bright sun and little moisture.Thinkstock/Comstock/Getty Images
  
  Desert ferns’ leaves curl up, conserving moisture during dry weather and open when it rains to absorb moisture. They have fewer, smaller leaves than ferns that evolved in humid climates. Their leaves are often round rather than long and slender. The edges of desert ferns sometimes roll under protecting the spores from the heat. Desert ferns often have tan, white or striped scales on their stems and sometimes on the bottoms of their leaves providing shade and reflecting light. Their leaves have fewer stomata or their stomata are partly sunken reducing water loss through transpiration. A waxy surface sometimes covers them, suppressing transpiration.
  
  

Roots

• Ferns usually have underground stems called rhizomes or aboveground stems called stolons. Rhizomes and stolons in desert ferns store food and sometimes water that are critical to their survival in periods of drought. Epiphytic ferns that grow in the branches of trees in tropical rainforests have roots that take moisture from the air.
  
  

Reproduction

• Ferns reproduce by spores, not seeds. The annulus of a fern releases spores into the air. There is little or no wind on the bottom of a forest floor, so the annulus of some species has the ability to snap violently expelling spores forcefully outward to catch as much breeze as possible.