Stands of maidenhair fern are plant architecture

Most of us don’t find it absolutely essential to know the name of every plant and animal we encounter, but it is certainly a great pleasure to know the more common ones on a first-name basis. Among the fern tribe, the one which always stops me in my tracks is the maidenhair.

Actually, you never really encounter a single maidenhair fern. They always occur in graceful stands of many plants, almost like minnows in a school. Each plant is forked at the summit of the slender black and polished stalk with slender recurved branches bearing pinnate divisions.

There are several varieties of this hardy species found in North America, India, and Japan and the ongoing research in regard to the forms which occur on serpentine outcrops is interesting. But here in our part of the southern highlands you’ll encounter the common variety of maidenhair (Adiantum pedatum) and it will more than suffice.

The plant favors cool, moist watersheds and is at its finest in rich upland coves. These chosen haunts tend to be dim, and in such retreats the feathery fronds hang tremulous and glistening, seemingly overweighted at the top and bent in layer upon layer of succulent density.