DISTRIBUTION AND OCCURRENCE
SPECIES: Blechnum spicant | Deer Fern 



GENERAL DISTRIBUTION : 
Deer fern has a sporadic circumpolar distribution.  In North America it
is distributed from coastal Alaska to California (Del Norte to Santa
Cruz counties).  Deer fern occurs mostly west of the Cascade Range
but is also found in northern Idaho [7,15,21,31].


ECOSYSTEMS : 
   FRES20  Douglas-fir
   FRES22  Western white pine
   FRES23  Fir - spruce
   FRES24  Hemlock - Sitka spruce
   FRES25  Larch
   FRES27  Redwood
   FRES28  Western hardwoods


STATES : 
     AK  CA  ID  OR  WA  BC


ADMINISTRATIVE UNITS : 
     GLBA  MORA  NOCA  OLYM  PORE  REDW


BLM PHYSIOGRAPHIC REGIONS : 
    1  Northern Pacific Border
    2  Cascade Mountains
    3  Southern Pacific Border
    4  Sierra Mountains


KUCHLER PLANT ASSOCIATIONS : 
   K001  Spruce - cedar - hemlock forest
   K002  Cedar - hemlock - Douglas-fir forest
   K003  Silver fir - Douglas-fir forest
   K004  Fir - hemlock forest
   K006  Redwood forest
   K012  Douglas-fir forest
   K013  Cedar - hemlock - pine forest
   K014  Grand fir - Douglas-fir forest
   K015  Western spruce - fir forest
   K025  Alder - ash forest
   K029  California mixed evergreen forest


SAF COVER TYPES : 
   201  White spruce
   205  Mountain hemlock
   206  Engelmann spruce - subalpine fir
   212  Western larch
   213  Grand fir
   215  Western white pine
   221  Red alder
   222  Black cottonwood - willow
   223  Sitka spruce
   224  Western hemlock
   225  Western hemlock - Sitka spruce
   226  Coastal true fir - hemlock
   227  Western redcedar - western hemlock
   228  Western redcedar
   229  Pacific Douglas-fir
   230  Douglas-fir - western hemlock
   231  Port-Orford-cedar
   232  Redwood
   234  Douglas-fir - tanoak - Pacific madrone


SRM (RANGELAND) COVER TYPES : 
NO-ENTRY


HABITAT TYPES AND PLANT COMMUNITIES : 
Deer fern is an indicator of moist to wet forests from sea level to
montane zones in southwestern Washington and western Oregon [15,28].  It
is also an indicator of moist to wet, poor-nutrient to moderate-nutrient
forests in British Columbia [24].  Deer fern is scattered to abundant,
and occasionally dominant, in understories of old-growth forests on
"water-receiving" sites [25].  Publications listing deer fern as a
dominant or codominant understory component include the following:

Natural vegetation of Oregon and Washington [12]
Gradient structure of forest vegetation in the central Washington
  Cascades [8]
Plant communities in the old-growth forests of north coastal Oregon [20]
Forest associations of Little Lost Man Creek, Humboldt County,
  California:  reference-level in the hierarchical structure of
  old-growth coastal redwood vegetation [27]
 
Some species commonly associated with deer fern include Alaska-cedar
(Chamaecyparis nootkatensis), noble fir (Abies procera), lodgepole pine
(Pinus contorta), Alaska blueberry (Vaccinium alaskensis), red
huckleberry (V. parviflorum), thimbleberry (Rubus parviflorus),
salmonberry (R. spectabilis), devil's club (Oplopanax horridus),
menziesia (Menziesia ferruginea), salal (Gaultheria shallon), Oregon
oxalis (Oxalis oregana), bunchberry (Cornus canadensis), false
lily-of-the-valley (Maianthemum dilatatum), twisted stalk (Streptopus
spp.), threeleaf foamflower (Tiarella trifoliata), woodnymph (Moneses
uniflora), pioneer violet (Viola glabrella), western swordfern
(Polystichum munitum), ladyfern (Athyrium filix-femina), bracken fern
(Pteridium aquilinum), oakfern (Gymnocarpium dryopteris), woodfern
(Dryopteris spp.), stiff clubmoss (Lycopodium annotinum), and many
species of mosses [1,6,17,20].

Related categories for Species: Blechnum spicant | Deer Fern