Title: Aquatic life
Identifier: aquaticlife219161917baus (find matches)
Year: 1916-1917 (1910s)
Authors: Bausman, Joseph E
Subjects: Aquariums; Fish culture
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. E. Bausman
Contributing Library: Harvard University, Museum of Comparative Zoology, Ernst Mayr Library
Digitizing Sponsor: Harvard University, Museum of Comparative Zoology, Ernst Mayr Library

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•••••••••••••••••••••••e•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• TKe Quillwort in Aquaria AQUA - PET ••••••••••••••!••••••••••••••••••••••••«•••**•••••****••••****••***•*••••••••••••••••< Even to botanists, the IsoETAcEae, re- gardless of its interesting characteristics, is a comparatively little known group of plants, comprising about fifty species. The generic name Isoetes is said to be derived from two Greek words meaning "equal" and "year," and was applied be- cause of the perennial character of the leaves. While the purpose of this article, primarily, to direct attention to their in- terest as aquarium plants, inasmuch as the)^ are usually ignored or given scant attention in vv^orks on the aquarium, it may not be amiss to give a brief descrip- tion which should aid in identification. The systematic botanist regards this group as a difficult one. Students of plant life are not by any means agreed as to what constitutes a distinct species of this genus, nor its relationship to other classes of plants. It belongs in that di- vision of the vegetable kingdom called Pte;ridophyta, which includes the ferns and some other spore-bearing or flower- less plants called the fern allies. In the scale of plant development the pterido- phytes are above the mosses and below flowering plants. Some botanists consider the Ouillwort to be related to the Moon- wort and Adders-tongue ferns, around which so much superstition clustered in ancient times, while others aver that its structure indicates a connection with the pines and related plants which are the more primitive forms of flowering plants. The quillwort is essentially an upright or spreading rosette of hollow, cylin- drical, pointed leaves of a grasslike or rush-like aspect. The leaves vary in length in the various species from a few inches to two feet, and in number from ten to two hundred, or even more, spring- ing from a flat bi-lobed or tri-lobed tuber- like rootstock. The new leaves are pro- duced from the centre of the rosette. The plant reproduces from spores, which are born in a hol'owed-out portion of the base of the outer leaves. The quillwort
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The Quillwort is heterosporous, that is, bears spores of the two sexes on the same plant, but in different leaves. The female spores are about one-fourth the size of a pinhead and few in number, while the male spores are about one-thousandth of an inch in diameter and very numerous. The spores have an outer coating of silicon, that of the male spore being beautifully sculp- tured. A microscope is, of course, re-

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