Pteris catoptera Retz. var. horridula Schelpe

Rhizome erect or procumbent, up to 10 mm in diameter; rhizome scales dark brown, linear, 3-4 mm long, margins ciliate. Fronds tufted, arching. Stipe strawcoloured, up to 90 cm long, shiny, glabrous except for few brown scales near base and sometimes with scattered spines. Lamina oblong to ovate in outline, up to 90 × 60 cm, 2-pinnatifid in upper part, 3-pinnatifid lower down with basal pair of pinnae strongly basiscopically developed into 1-3 subpinnae, glabrous. Ultimate lobes thinly textured, linear to oblong, apex rounded, margins entire to subentire; veins free. Rhachis strawcoloured, glabrous, smooth or spiny, ventrally grooved; costae and costules on upper surface with fine spines. Sori in marginal line for most of the length of the fertile lobes; indusium narrow, membranous.

Pteris dentata and Pteris buchananii have crenate-serrate lobe apices; Pteris friesii does not have spines on the costules above and on the veins below.

kato: below, pteros: winged; the basal pair of pinnae is basiscopically developed: an allusion to its wing-like appearance.

Terrestrial in evergreen forest.

Africa, Madagascar, Comoro Isl.

Angola, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Dem. Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea (incl. Bioko), Ethiopia, Ghana, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Malawi, Mali, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Sudan and South Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania , Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe.

Terrestrial.