Salviniaceae

Belongs within: Leptosporangiatae.

The Salviniaceae are a family of small, free-floating aquatic ferns. There are two distinctive living genera, Azolla and Salvinia. Salvinia species have large leaves, about two centimetres long, covered in long papillae, whereas Azolla have small leaves, one or two millimetres long, that are imbricate in two rows (Harden 1990).

Characters (Smith et al. 2006): Plants free-floating, roots present (Azolla) or lacking (Salvinia); stems protostelic, dichotomously branched; leaves sessile, alternate, small (ca. 1-25 mm long), round to oblong, entire; veins free (Azolla) or anastomosing (Salvinia); spores of two kinds (plants heterosporous), large megaspores and small microspores, these globose, trilete; spore germination endosporic; x = 9 (Salvinia), 22 (Azolla).

<==Salviniaceae [Salviniales, Salviniidae]
    |  i. s.: Daharia Barale & Ouaja 2002BO02
    |           `--*D. tunisiensis Barle & Ouaja 2002BO02
    |--SalviniaSP09
    |    |--S. auriculariaF04
    |    |--S. cucullataP88
    |    |--S. formosaHL08
    |    |--S. molesta Mitchell 1972B06
    |    |--S. natans (Linnaeus) Allioni 1785 [=Marsilea natans Linnaeus 1763; incl. S. verticillata Roxb. ex Griffith 1844]B06
    |    |--S. reussii Ettingshausen 1866HL08
    |    |--S. rotundifoliaNB-P09
    |    `--S. stewartii Jain 1971C93
    `--+--GlomerisporitesSP09
       `--Azolla Lamarck 1783SP09, A61 [Azollaceae]
            |--A. carolinianaM03
            |--A. distincta Snead 1969C93
            |--A. extincta Jain 1971C93
            |--A. filiculoidesWP05 [incl. A. magellanicaM03]
            |    |--A. f. var. filiculoidesH90
            |    `--A. f. var. rubraH90 [=A. rubra Br. 1810A61]
            |--A. imbricata (Roxburgh) Nakai 1925 [=Salvinia imbricata Roxburgh ex Griffith 1844]B06
            |--A. mexicanaH93
            |--A. pinnataKLG05
            `--A. priscaJD05

*Type species of generic name indicated

References

[A61] Allan, H. H. 1961. Flora of New Zealand vol. 1. Indigenous Tracheophyta: Psilopsida, Lycopsida, Filicopsida, Gymnospermae, Dicotyledones. R. E. Owen, Government Printer: Wellington (New Zealand).

[BO02] Barale, G., & M. Ouaja. 2002. La biodiversité végétale des gisements d’âge Jurassique supérieur-Crétacé inférieur de Merbah El Asfer (Sud-Tunisien). Cretaceous Research 23: 707–737.

[B06] Biswas, A. 2006. Pteridophytes of Indian Botanic Garden, Howrah. Bulletin of the Botanical Survey of India 48: 175–188.

[C93] Cleal, C. J. 1993. Pteridophyta. In: Benton, M. J. (ed.) The Fossil Record 2 pp. 779–794. Chapman & Hall: London.

[F04] Ferrar, P. 2004. Australian entomology: isolated, or in touch with the rest of the world? Australian Journal of Entomology 43 (3): 329–333.

[H90] Harden, G. J. (ed.) 1990. Flora of New South Wales vol. 1. New South Wales University Press.

[HL08] Henniger, M., & R. Leder. 2008. Eozäne Makroflora der Querfurter Mulde. Mauritiana 20 (2): 229–251.

[H93] Hickman, J. C. (ed.) 1993. The Jepson Manual: Higher Plants of California. University of California Press: Berkeley (California).

[JD05] Junge, F. W., M. Dolezych, H. Walther, T. Böttger, A. Kühl, L. Kunzmann, P. Morgenstern, T. Steinberg & R. Stange. 2005. Ein Fenster in Landschaft und Vegetation vor 37 Millionen Jahren: Lithologische, sedimentgeochemische und paläobotanische Befunde aus einem Paläoflusssystem des Weißelsterbeckens. Mauritiana 19 (2): 185–273.

[KLG05] Kumar, S., J. Lal & P. Gupta. 2005. Ricciocarpos Corda (Hepaticae) from Maldah district, West Bengal: a new generic record for Gangetic Plain. Bulletin of the Botanical Survey of India 47: 131–132.

[M03] Macloskie, G. 1903. Pteridophyta, ferns and fernlike plants. In: Scott, W. B. (ed.) Reports of the Princeton University Expeditions to Patagonia, 1896–1899 vol. 8. Botany pp. 127–138. The University: Princeton (New Jersey).

[NB-P09] Norton, R. A., & V. M. Behan-Pelletier. 2009. Suborder Oribatida. In: Krantz, G. W., & D. E. Walter (eds) A Manual of Acarology 3^rd ed. pp. 430–564. Texas Tech University Press.

[SP09] Schuettpelz, E., & K. M. Pryer. 2009. Evidence for a Cenozoic radiation of ferns in an angiosperm-dominated canopy. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA 106 (27): 11200–11205.

Smith, A. R., K. M. Pryer, E. Schuettpelz, P. Korall, H. Schneider & P. G. Wolf. 2006. A classification for extant ferns. Taxon 55 (3): 705–731.

[WP05] Wikström, N., & K. M. Pryer. 2005. Incongruence between primary sequence data and the distribution of a mitochondrial atp1 group II intron among ferns and horsetails. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 36: 484–493.