TITLE:
Asplenium nidus; The Bird’s Nest Fern: Developmental Studies and Its Conservation
AUTHORS:
Ruchi Srivastava, P. L. Uniyal
KEYWORDS:
Reproductive Biology; Asplenium nidus
JOURNAL NAME:
American Journal of Plant Sciences,
Vol.4 No.5A,
May
30,
2013
ABSTRACT: Asplenium nidus L. commonly called as Bird’s Nest
Fern, is a threatened, ornamental fern, which is widely used as
novel foliage ornamental plant and local people use it in worship. The taxon is threatened due to over
exploitation, habitat
destruction and genetic barriers. To understand the constraints in the
regeneration, reproductive biology studies are made. It is observed that more sporophytes are produced in composite
population (13.3%) in comparison to isolate population (10%). This pattern is
suggestive of the fact that the parental sporophyte is heterozygous for recessive sporophytic lethal. On
the basis of the results obtained A. nidus was initially adapted for
outbreeding with the capacity for considerable amount of inbreeding. The low
potential of sporophyte production in isolate gametophyte could be the constitution
of the zygotic genotype.