Dicranopteris linearis (Burm. f.) Underw., Bull. Torrey Bot. Club 34(5): 250 250 1907. (Syn: Dicranopteris dichotoma (Thunb.) Bernh.; Gleichenia ferruginea Blume; Gleichenia hermanni R. Br.; Gleichenia lanigera D. Don; Gleichenia linearis (Burm. f.) C.B. Clarke; Gleichenia rigida J. Sm.; Mertensia lessonii A. Rich.; Mertensia linearis (Burm. f.) Fritsch; Mertensia rufinervis Mart.; Platyzoma ferrugineum Desv.; Platyzoma latum Desv.; Polypodium lineare Burm. f.; Polypodium pedatum Houtt.; Pteris platylata Christenh.);
GIANT FERN.........31.10.2011..............S.S.......53: Please can someone give me the name of this giant fern. Date/Time-......15th April 2011. Location- Place, Altitude, GPS-... Near Neora Jungle camp. Near Lava. West Bengal. Fairly high up. Habitat- Garden/ Urban/ Wild/ Type-..... Wild. Besides a track through the forest. Plant Habit- Tree/ Shrub/ Climber/ Herb- ......Fern Height/Length-...... Giant 8ft plus maybe. i think nephrolepsis sps If it assumes tree size, it may be Alsophila sp. Thank you hari for your suggestion of Nephrolepis. However, I cannot see any that look like it. Thank you ... for your suggestion of Alsophila. Again I can see nothing like it. If you look at my pics you can see my head in pic 4. The ferns tower above me. But the growth is not with a trunk as tree ferns grow. Each frond is forked and keeps re forking as it get larger. I have tried searching www and the nearest I get is the forked ferns in Gleicheniaceae. Nearest is Diplopterygium .. see image below. http://www.plantsystematics.org/imgs/robbin/r/Gleicheniaceae_Diplopterygium_bancroftii_5390.html However, I do know ferns are very very difficult to id especially from a few amateur images. I do not know whether the above ferns even grow in India. I was hoping that there might be an expert with local knowledge of the ferns that grow near Lava that would immediately say what it is. I should have mentioned that it was towering above me... but was growing on a steep bank, and weeping downwards towards the track. DICRANOPTERIS LINEARIS I was actually thinking of Dicranopteris but I think I have seen this in Sikkim. It is much bigger with longer fronds. I just have a closeup though :(
Dicranopteris linearis ( Burm.f.) Underw. wild fern from Western Ghats Tamilnadu. Yes, that's D. linearis all right, in its established, stabilised sense. The other species present in South India is D. taiwanensis, but that is quite different. But a nasty little problem arose - the lectotype of D. linearis is unfortunately a Javan specimen, not the Sri Lankan one most people thought. In Java the genus is much more complex and the lectotpye is actually a specimen of the S.E. Asian D. curranii- not noticed by Mazumdar when he contributed the taxonomy to Callmander & Fumeaux's detailed paper on Burman's ferns of the Flora Indica (Candollea 2019). It would be unthinkable to swap over such a widely known name and it needs a proposal in Taxon to conserve the name Polypodium lineare Burm.f. with a new conserved type. That will of course be recommended, but will take time for final decision to be made. In the meantime we should go on calling this plant D. linearis...
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Species- Ferns (families, genera, species) > A---L > G > Gleicheniaceae > Dicranopteris >
