Comptonia columbiana is an extinct species of sweet fern in the flowering plant family Myricaceae.

[4] Work in other Okanagan Highlands localities has also increased the distribution of C. columbiana, with specimens reported from the Quilchena flora[5] and the Klondike Mountain Formation of Washington state.

[9] The Okanagan Highland sites represent upland lake systems that were surrounded by a warm temperate ecosystem with nearby volcanism.

[10] The highlands likely had a mesic upper microthermal to lower mesothermal climate, in which winter temperatures rarely dropped low enough for snow, and which were seasonably equitable.

Princeton's multiple linear regression CLAMP results gave a slightly lower 5.1 °C (41.2 °F), and the LMA returned a mean annual temperature of 5.1 ± 2.2 °C (41.2 ± 4.0 °F).

Further specimens and better dating of the Thunder Mountain flora to an older Eocene age led Axelrod to move the Comptonia fossils to C.

[12] Meyer and Manchester (1997) tentatively placed fossils recovered from the John Day Formations Rupelian stage[13] Bridge Creek Flora within Comptonia columbiana.

During the study of Morella rubra and its relationships in the family Liu et al (2015) utilized C. columbiana for a calibration species anchored at 49 mya rooting the Comptonia peregrina outgroup data.

The lobes have one to two teeth on the upper apex, and the slightly curving veins angling into the tooth tips.

[1] Wolfe and Wehr expanded on the description to note the leaves are simple rather than compound, and notably double serrate.