India’s first cryptogamic garden

About Cryptogams-

• A cryptogam (scientific name Cryptogamae) is a plant or a plant-like organism that reproduces by spores, without flowers or seeds.
• “Cryptogamae” means “hidden reproduction”, referring to the fact that no seed is produced.
• Other names, such as “thallophytes”, “lower plants”, and “spore plants” are also occasionally used.
• The best-known groups of cryptogams are algae, lichens, mosses and ferns, and also includes non-photosynthetic organisms traditionally classified as plants, such as fungi, slime molds, and bacteria.
• Algae comprises the most primitive organisms which are predominantly aquatic, both in marine as well as freshwater habitats.
• Ferns are the largest living group of primitive vascular plants while fungi is a kingdom of usually multicellular eukaryotic organisms that are heterotrophs.
• Bryophytes are the simplest and primitive land plants that occupy an intermediate position between algae and pteridophytes. 
• Lichens are a complex life form that is a symbiotic partnership of two separate organisms, a fungus and an algae.
• Cryptogams are considered among the best bioindicators, as they grow only at places without pollution and with ample soil moisture.
• These species will just vanish even if there is the slightest deviation in the environmental indicators.
• Not all cryptogams are treated as part of the plant kingdom; the fungi, in particular, are regarded as a separate kingdom, more closely related to animals than plants, while blue-green algae are now regarded as a phylum of bacteria. 

The names of all cryptogams are regulated by the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants.