Botany, Antique Print, Chromolithograph, Drytopteris cristata, crested wood fern,  Lindman

Antique colored lithograph (chromolithograph) after Swedish botanist and botanial artist Carl Axel Magnus Lindman (1856-1928) for his folio "Bilder ur nordens Flora" (Pictures of Northern Flora). He was inspired by military botanical artist Johan Wilhelm Palmstuch who embarked on a scientific project to produce a series of impressive copper engravings, 1802–1819."Svensk Botanik" (Swedish Botany) was the first of its kind in Sweden.

This botanical is an example of a pinnate-pinnatfid structure with one large central frond showing front, a detail of a pinnate rear in the top left showing the scalloped sporangia holding the spores,  below a detail view from the surface of the pinnate, and at the base the rhizome with three emerging "fiddleheads".

Published Stockholm by Wahlstrom & Widstrand, 1901-1905.

Condition = Excellent (no discoloration/tears)

Page size = 16.5 x 24.2 cm (6 1/2 x 9 1/2 inch)

Dryopteris cristata (Crested wood fern or crested buckler-fern)

The crested wood fern is native to wetlands throughout the Northern Hemisphere as it needs constant moisture. The fronds often grow up to a meter or more in height. The fern sends up erect narrow fertile fronds and spreading sterile fronds from a very stout creeping rhizome. Fronds are up to 70cm long and up to 12 cm wide. Sterile fronds are less than 3/4 the length of the fertile fronds and stay green into the winter; fertile fronds, which are more erect, die back. The blades are about 4 times longer than wide. Sterile fronds are slightly broader. Both taper to a blunt-pointed tip. The stipe (Stem emerging from the rhizome) is grooved, with a swollen base and has scattered brown scales.