Rare teratologies in natural populations of Ophioglossum L exhibiting development of spores on tropophylls (leaves)

Abstract

A few biotypes (plants possessing abnormal features) of Goswamia costata Zhang and Zhang, partly resembling Ophioglossum rubellum Welw. ex A. Braun, are presented out of which finding of the development of spores on the tropophyll (leaf) of plants is exceedingly important.

Most alarming feature is that the spores on leaves do not resemble spores produced by the sporangia in the sporophore (fertile spike) of the parent plant, a trait only so far described by the senior author more than two decades ago on margins of Ophioglossum eliminatum Khandelwal and Goswami and Ophioglossum costatum A Br, (now—Goswamia eliminata Zhang and Zhang; Goswamia costata Zhang and Zhang, respectively). The repeated observations of development of spores in cluster on the margins of tropophyll (leaf) from altogether different regions and localities in a different species do confirm that genes for the production of sporangia on the leaves are inherent within the genome of ophioglossaceous genera. Preliminary SEM investigations on spores have revealed unique secondary extensions of exine ornamentations with tubular outgrowths, never reported in any of the ophioglossaceous species.