Dicksonia antarctica - Soft Treefern
IDENTIFYING FEATURES:
* typical understory in moist mountain gullies (especially in Victoria & Tasmania) often beneath Mountain Ash (Eucalyptus regnans), but becoming less abundant higher up the slopes ... also grows in New South Wales and SE Queensland but is less common
* croziers and crown covered with soft reddish-brown cylindrical hairs
* croziers often produced in a flush in spring
* sori two-valved, marginal (typical of the genus Dicksonia)
* trunk often massive under good conditions, greatly thickened with soft fibrous roots, and a favourite host of many epiphytic ferns
In northern New South Wales and SE Queensland, where this fern is far less common than in the far south, it appears that buds are produced on the trunk. When slabs of these trunks are cut for use in the nursery trade (for mounting epiphytes for example) the dormant buds will often sprout to form sizeable new plants, quite distinct from tiny Dicksonia sporelings that often arise on treefern slabs. |
