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Equisetum × Mchaffieae
''Equisetum'' (; horsetail, snake grass, puzzlegrass) is the only living genus in Equisetaceae, a family of ferns, which reproduce by spores rather than seeds. ''Equisetum'' is a "living fossil", the only living genus of the entire subclass Equisetidae, which for over 100 million years was much more diverse and dominated the understorey of late Paleozoic forests. Some equisetids were large trees reaching to tall. The genus ''Calamites'' of the family Calamitaceae, for example, is abundant in coal deposits from the Carboniferous period. The pattern of spacing of nodes in horsetails, wherein those toward the apex of the shoot are increasingly close together, is said to have inspired John Napier to invent logarithms. Modern horsetails first appeared during the Jurassic period. A superficially similar but entirely unrelated flowering plant genus, mare's tail (''Hippuris''), is occasionally referred to as "horsetail", and adding to confusion, the name "mare's tail" is sometimes app ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Equisetum Telmateia
''Equisetum telmateia'', the great horsetail or northern giant horsetail, is a species of ''Equisetum'' (puzzlegrass) with an unusual distribution, with one subspecies native to Europe, western Asia and northwest Africa, and a second subspecies native to western North America.Hyde, H. A., Wade, A. E., & Harrison, S. G. (1978). ''Welsh Ferns''. National Museum of Wales . The North American subspecies is often simply but ambiguously called "giant horsetail", but that name may just as well refer to the Latin American '' Equisetum giganteum'' and '' Equisetum myriochaetum''. Description It is an herbaceous perennial plant, with separate green photosynthetic sterile stems, and pale yellowish non-photosynthetic spore-bearing fertile stems. The sterile stems, produced in late spring and dying down in late autumn, are 30–150 cm (rarely to 240 cm) tall (the tallest species of horsetail outside of tropical regions) and 1 cm diameter, heavily branched, with whorls of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
