ferns ~ 12/07/13 ~ Fort Ord

western bracken fern (and possibly coastal wood fern)
Pteridium aquilinum var. pubescens (and possibly Dryopteris arguta)
Dennstaedtiaceae (and possibly Dryopteridaceae)

Look how prolific the ferns were this year.  Oh my!  I haven't been out to Fort Ord since May, so this was a little bit of a surprise to me.  While I'm normally not a big fan of brown, I appreciated the subtle variation of shades from copper to rusty chocolate. Doh!  When I took these pictures, I had assumed they were all western bracken fern. However, as I was checking information, I discovered there's a similar looking coastal wood fern also reported at Fort Ord.  Even if I had gotten decent close-ups, I'm not sure I'd be able to tell them apart.  I generally try to avoid fern IDs, but they were impossible to ignore this time.