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For more than 300 million years, Ferns have grown in different habitats around the world. Today, there are more than 12,000 unique species. Ferns are strong, “vascular” plants with well-developed internal vein structures for the proper flow of water and nutrients. However, Ferns are also delicate in that they need the right conditions to reproduce.
Unlike flowering plants that reproduce through male to female pollen fertilization, Ferns reproduce from the spores of a parent or adult plant. Given suitable moisture and light, spores turn into a gametophyte, then a sporophyte, and finally a full adult Fern to produce spores of its own and repeat the life cycle.
Growing Ferns indoors is becoming increasingly difficult as a result of the transition to forced air and steam heat systems. Ferns flourish in humid climates and newer systems present a challenge. Growing Ferns outdoors has also posed problems as native areas like the tropics and subtropics are continually devastated due to construction and global warming climate shifts.
For DDA, Ferns represent our effort to be environmentally conscious in daily activities in and out of the office. When one person or business does its part to be green, another is made aware and in turn finds ways to protect the environment as well. Just like the Ferns that spread on the ground under the forest canopy, so does environmental preservation spread throughout the world. The fragility of the Fern when grown inside or out demonstrates the delicate nature of plant life, and symbolizes our need to be vigilant in protecting our natural surroundings.
If we plant the Fern, it will thrive. If we start going green, we will leave the earth as it was given when Ferns first arrived.
We encourage you to join DDA’s mission to go green in and out of the workplace for as a Native American Proverb states, “We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.”
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