Aspidium pungens Kaulf.
Dryopteris pungens (Kaulf.) Kuntze

Rhizome creeping, 8-20 mm in diameter; rhizome scales up to 15 mm long, lanciolate in outline, reddish brown, margin with small tooth. Fronds closely spaced, arching. Stipe pale-brown, 25-40 cm long, with pale reddish, concolorous scales up to 15 mm long, particularly towards the base. Lamina roughly ovate in outline, 2-pinnate, with basal pinnae pair somewhat reduced, 40-60 × 26-40 cm. Pinnules asymmetrically lanceolate in outline with a developed acroscopic basal lobe, slightly falcate, venation apparent on both surfaces, hairless above, with a few hair-like scales along the veins and costules below, margins toothed, each tooth ending in a sharp bristlelike appendage. Rhachis lightly set with twisted hairlike scales, interspersed with a few pale, bullate, ovate scales commonly situated at the base of each pinnulerust-coloured scales. Sori round; indusia entire to slightly irregular, peltate with the central portion usually blackish, c. 1 mm in diameter.

pungens: ending in a hard, sharp point, a reference to the sharp hairs along the pinnule margin.

Forest floor.

See African distribution.

South Africa, Swaziland.

Terrestrial.