Asplenium japonicum Thunb.
Diplazium japonicum (Thunb.) Bedd.
Athyrium japonicum (Thunb.) Copel.
Lunathyrium japonicum (Thunb.) Sa. Kurata
Athyriopsis japonica (Thunb.) Ching

Black lady fern.

Rhizome short-creeping, branching, c. 5 mm in diameter; rhizome scales lanceolate in outline, apex gradually tapering to a point, margin entire, 3-6 mm long, uniformly midbrown. Fronds somewhat dimorphic, the fertile ones taller, narrower, more erect, herbaceous, deciduous. Stipe 8-30 cm long, dark brown to more straw-coloured apically, shallowly grooved above, swollen or not at base, densely scaly at base, becoming subglabrous with age. Lamina deeply 2-pinnatifid to almost 2-pinnate on the basal pinnae, oblong-lanceolate in outline, apex gradually tapering to a point, sometimes slightly narrowed toward base, 22-40 x 13-26 cm; pinnae 12 to 16 pairs, lanceolate to linear-lanceolate in outline, apex gradually tapering to a point, to 12 x 2.5 cm, halfway or deeply pinnatifid; lobes oblong-falcate in outline, apex rounded to pointed, margin with irregular blunt teeth, both surfaces with scattered, minute, twisted, whitish scales along the veins and costae, also on the rhachis; costae grooved above, discontinuous with the rhachis; veins free. Sori 8-16 per lobe, on veins, arranged generally in a herringbone pattern, linear, 2-3.5(5) mm long; indusium linear, persistent, brown, entire, membranous.

Naturalised

japonica: Japanese.

Damp, mossy rocks, often next to a stream or on wet earth banks in shade in evergreen forest; occasionally in wattle plantations.

Polynesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, China, Korea, Japan, eastern Siberia, New Zealand, Australia, Thailand, India, South africa and Swaziland.

South Africa, Swaziland.

Lithophytic, terrestrial.