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Lady-fern

Lady-fern

Athyrium filix-femina

Identify the Lady-fern from a photo and log your finds with Florapass.

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How common: Very common

Lady-fern is a large, delicate-looking fern that grows in soft, feathery clumps. It is common in moist, shady woods and along streams across much of the Northern Hemisphere, and is also used as a garden plant.

Did you know?

  • Ferns don’t flower; lady-fern spreads by dust-like spores made on the leaf undersides.
  • Gardeners have bred many ornamental forms of lady-fern.

About the species

Identification

Forms a tuft of many leaves 50–100 cm tall from a short, upright base. The leaf stalk is scaly and usually less than a quarter of the full leaf length. Each leaf is narrow, widest near the middle, and very finely divided into many narrow, long-tipped parts with small teeth. Undersides often show rows of small brown spore patches that are oval and slightly curved. Compared with the stiffer “male-fern” group (Dryopteris), lady-fern looks softer and more finely cut, with curved rows of spore patches rather than round dots.

Plant group

Ferns, horsetails and clubmosses

Habitat

herb-rich forest

About the habitat

Prefers moist, shaded places such as stream banks, rich damp woods, wet thickets, and ditches; also on lush mountain meadows below the treeline. Found throughout Finland; rare in the far north (Inari and the Käsivarsi area of Lapland).

Sources

Photo: Agnieszka Kwiecień, Nova, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Athyrium filix-femina Wietlica samicza Rezerwat przyrody Łazy 2022-06-20 01.jpg

Text: Pinkka: Luonnonvaraiset lääkekasvit - Sanikkaiset, CC BY 4.0 https://laji.fi/taxon/MX.37763

Text: Pinkka: A Pohjolan kasveja - Saniaiset ja liekokasvit, CC BY 4.0 https://laji.fi/taxon/MX.37763

Text: Pinkka: BIO-514 Pohjois-Suomen putkilokasvit - Saniaiset ja liekokasvit, CC BY 4.0 https://laji.fi/taxon/MX.37763

Text: Pinkka: Metsälajintuntemus - Sanikkaiset, CC BY 4.0 https://laji.fi/taxon/MX.37763

Text: Wikipedia (Finnish), CC BY-SA 4.0 https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soreahiirenporras

See also