Jeff Nelson, KNPS President

As I write this, I am looking out at our woods in southwest McCracken Co., covered in 4″ of fresh snow. I have always loved to walk in the woods in the winter. The deciduous trees have lost most of their leaves and you can see their form and structure more clearly. Most of the herbaceous species have gone dormant but dried stalks with seed heads dot the woods. And if one looks, one will also see many species of native plants still photosynthesizing away throughout any woodland in Kentucky.

There are several species of native plants that take advantage of the extra sunlight reaching the woodland floor to photosynthesize throughout the winter. One of my favorite of these species is cutleaf grapefern (Sceptridium dissectum), which grows widely in our woods. Grapefern is also known as bronze fern for the color the sterile fronds turn after a hard frost or freeze. The bronze color, caused by anthocyanins in the sterile fronds, helps the fern withstand harsh winter conditions and the extra sunlight by reducing the amount of sunlight absorbed, preventing excessive water loss, and other cell damage. Grapefern will photosynthesize throughout the winter, with the fronds usually senescing in the spring. The sterile fronds will reemerge in the summer, with the fertile fronds appearing in late summer.