PLANTS &
BOTANY

Pick up any fern today, a garden fern, a rainforest fern, a fern growing from a stone wall, and you are holding one of the most ancient plant designs on Earth. Ferns appeared 360 million years ago, long before flowers, long before trees as we know them, long before dinosaurs walked. They have barely changed since. The curled fiddlehead that uncurls into a frond, the spore dots on the underside of leaves, the preference for damp shadowy places, it's the same design used for 360 million years. Ferns are living time capsules.