Asplenium trichomanes
A small, evergreen, very hardy fern with rows of tiny rounded pinnae on wiry black stalks. It grows in crevices of cliffs, rocks, scree and old walls across temperate and mountain regions of much of the world. It is best grown outdoors in a wall or trough, or in a cool, bright terrarium. It fails in warm, stuffy rooms.
Where it grows wild
Crevices in cliffs, rock outcrops, scree, mine waste and old mortared walls, usually in full or partial shade. The subspecies differ in rock choice: subsp. trichomanes grows on acidic rocks such as granite, sandstone and basalt, and subsp. quadrivalens grows on limestone, dolomite and lime mortar.
It grows from sea level to about 3000 m in North America and to 870 m in the British Isles. The 30 wild records with elevation span 300–1505 m, median 554 m.
🔒 Growing it like that
The wild conditions above, turned into targets for a shelf, a tent or a greenhouse. The full profile has:
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Profiles are drafts built from measured range and climate and from published sources; each section carries its own confidence in the app. Photo from Wikimedia Commons, used under its CC BY-SA 3.0 licence, unmodified.