Roots usually 10 or fewer, yellow or brown, 0.5--1.5mm diam. 1 cm from base. Plants less than 15 cm. Common stalk lacking idioblasts. Trophophore short-stalked or nearly sessile (long-stalked in forms of B . simplex and B . pedunculosum ) arising from the middle or high on common stalk (low in some individuals of B . montanum , B . mormo , and B . simplex ), blade usually 1 per plant, appearing in spring and dying in summer or fall, absent during winter, mostly linear to oblong to oblong deltate (deltate in B . lanceolatum ), lobed to 1--2(--3)-pinnate, mostly less than 2.5 cm wide when mature, herbaceous to leathery. Leaf primordia glabrous. Leaf sheath closed. Pinna lobes and segments, when present, asymmetric, either borne basiscopically or acroscopically. Sporophores long- or short-stalked, arising from middle to distal portion of common stalk, well above ground level (low on common stalk, near ground level in some forms of B . simplex ), always present, stalks and rachis only slightly flattened, not fleshy, 0.5--2 mm wide. x =45.

Species ca. 25 (21 in the flora): worldwide.

Trophophore blades of most species in Botrychium subg. Botrychium are divided into lobes or segments and are not truly pinnate except in those species with fan-shaped segments. Very rarely, blades are more than 1-pinnate (western form of B . simplex ).