Sweet Fern
Plants of the Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden

Common
Name

Scientific
Name

Plant
Family

Garden
Location

Prime
Season
Sweet Fern
Comptonia peregrina (L.) J.M. Coult
Bayberry
Upland
Spring
Other names and notes
Sweet Fern is a small shrub, densely branching, that spreads by rhizomes, forming colonies and is thus, good as a ground cover. The flowers are monoecious - separate sexes. The male flowers (shown here at left) are elongated catkins, yellow-green in color, and appear in clusters at the end of twigs. Female flowers are short rounded catkins that have reddish bracts and appear bur-like when mature. One or both sexes can appear on a single plant. These produce a round cluster of (usually) four ovoid brown 1/4" long nutlets in August, which mature in September and October. The leaves are alternate and linear - 2 to 4" long but only up to 1/2" wide and have irregular teeth, creating 20 or more rounded lobes, so that they somewhat resemble ferns. The leaves are also fragrant when crushed, thus completing the common name of "sweet fern". The genus name Comptonia, is named for the Rev. Henry Compton, 1632-1713, Bishop of Oxford. The older scientific name for the species is Myrica asplenifolia.
Sweet Fern flower
Sweet Fern Plant
Sweet Fern Fruit
Above: The yellowish-green male catkins. Photo courtesy ©Christopher Noll, Freckmann Herbarium, University of Wisconsin, Steven's Point Above and below: The long, irregularly toothed fragrant leaves resembling a fern, from which comes the common name. Above: The ovoid brown nutlets formed in the bur-like cluster of the female flower in late summer. Photo courtesy ©Kathy Kohout, Freckmann Herbarium, University of Wisconsin, Steven's Point
 
Sweet Fern leaf
  
Notes: Eloise Butler's first notation on planting this species was on Sept. 4th, 1909 with plants obtained from Stony Brook, Ma. Martha Crone reported planting it on July 31, 1933 (4 plants from Duluth), on Aug. 17, 1933 (7 plants from Hinkley) and on July 30, 1934 (12 plants from Duluth) and noted planting them in a sandy site. The older scientific name used at the time was Myrica asplenifolia. However, Sweet Fern was not listed on Martha Crone's 1951 Garden Census. The plant is native and it's range is entirely east of the Mississippi with Minnesota the western most state. In Minnesota Sweet Fern is found only in the NE Quadrant, hence the Garden population is somewhat unique. It tends to grow on sandy, dry sites. It is often the first species to appear on burned-over areas. Sweet fern appears in coniferous forest openings or woodlot edges and prefers acid soils over limestone soils. It is nitrogen fixing and is a good ground cover and bank stabilizer. The grey hairstreak butterfly (Strymon melinus) is restricted to feeding on sweet fern in the northern limits of its range. It is also used as a food plant by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species.  
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References: Plant characteristics are generally from sources 15, 16, 30, 31, 33, W2 & W3. Distribution principally from W2 and also 31, 34 and W1. Planting history generally from 1, 4 & 4a. Other sources by specific reference. See Reference List for details.  
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