Species of Ophioglossum in India: their Taxonomy and Phylogeny

The paper gives an account of the taxonomy of the genus Ophioglossum of which ten species are found in India. In doing so morphology of the leaf, stipules, spore and epidermal characters are taken into account and a key based on all characters is given to identify species. They are also summarised in a table. The question of confused taxonomy of species like O. reticulatum, O. vulgatum and O. aitchisoni has been specifically discussed and the probable phylogeny of Indian species is schematically represented. The characters of stipules which were overlooked so far are given in detail.