1.

0 INTRODUCTION

Pteridophytes are the first true land plants: It is speculated that life began in the oceans,
and through millions of years of evolution, life slowly adapted on to dry land. And among the
first of the plants to truly live on land were the Pteridophytes. Pteridophytes are seedless, and
they procreate through spores. They don’t have conducting tissues for transportation of water
and minerals. Pteridophytes show a true alternation of generations. Here, the dominant
sporophyte produces spores through meiosis. Dryopteris is a large genus of mostly Northern
Hemisphere ferns comprising c. 225 species (Hoshizaki and Wilson 1999) in the family
Dryopteridaceae, some 50 – 80 genera occur in this family depending on treatment The
gametophyte generation forms gametes by mitosis. The spores are produced by the sporangia in
the spore mother cells. These spores germinate and give rise to gametophytes. These
gametophytes are free-living, multicellular, and photosynthetic. They are called as the
prothallus. Generally, the gametophytes require damp and cool places to grow, due to their
dependence on water. For this reason, the growth of pteridophytes is confined to certain
geographical areas. Antherozoids (male organ) can get transferred to the archegonia which are
the female sex organs, only in the presence of water. Once the fusion of the gametes occurs, a
zygote is formed. This zygote produces the sporophyte, after division. When the spores of the
plants are similar then these plants are called homosporous plants. Heterosporous plants are the
ones that have two different kinds of spores. They are the megaspores and the microspores. In
these heterosporous plants, the megaspores and microspores germinate and give female and
male gametophytes respectively.

Male ferns became popular indoor plants during the Victorian Era. Today, they are used
as specimens in atriums, greenhouses and conservatories and we find them in the smallest
apartments to the largest homes. They offer a quiet, graceful beauty by softening landscapes
indoors and out. Among the nonflowering plants, ferns and their relatives are unique.
Numbering about 9,000, they represent a wide assortment of plant forms, and they have a very
unusual life cycle. The life cycle is unusual because it consists of two distinct generations of
two different plants. The male fern, as we know it, is the sexless or sporophyte generation.
Instead of growing from seed like most flowering plants, ferns come from a single spore. Spores
become gametophytes, which produce male gametes and an egg structure. When fertilized, the
gametophyte generates a sporophyte (the fern plant). As a fern develops, the young stipe or stem
of the frond is quite interesting and unusual as it unfurls. It is sometimes called crosier since it
resembles a shepherd's crook or a bishop.

This research explored the effect of light environment on the growth of Dryopteris filix-
mass in two different habitats in Kolej MARA Kulim which is high humidity and shade
condition and lees humidity and have direct sunlight. The species that had been monitored is
fern species as they have dominated the area of the study field for a long time and much easier
to be found. On the other hand, the sites that had been chosen for the study are an open garden
and near a closed pond in Kolej MARA Kulim. Both sites are different from each other in term
of the availability of the resources such as food and nutrients and spaces. These are the limited
resources that affecting the growth of the male fern. The physical characteristics of the male
ferns population in both sites were investigated based on their weight and length; those with
slow and small forms and those with fast or massive growth forms, was compared. Those
differences will be associated with the limiting factors that cause the competition interactions
among the population. The aim of this research is to present an overview of the traits about the
effect of light environment on the growth of Dryopteris flix-mass. At the same time, the
application of individual-based modelling offers the prospect of progress towards greater
realism and accuracy in predicting competitive outcomes. This review draws together a wide
and disparate literature on intraspecific competition in ferns to facilitate the work of both
empiricists and theoreticians towards these important goals. To this end, both the growth of male
ferns in the presence of light have been considered.