Rhizome ± erect or short-to very short-creeping, to 5 mm diam., stoloniferous or (in N.T. and Cape York Peninsula) stolons lacking; scales triangular, dark brown, ±opaque, with shortly ciliate margins and prominent apical seta, or (in Cape York Peninsula) occasionally yellow, ±translucent, with entire margins and acuminate apex, in both forms sometimes contorted but not spirally curled. Fronds erect to arching, to 75 cm long, usually loosely clustered, or (in Cape York Peninsula) markedly tufted. Stipe and rachises bearing few to many ephemeral 2-celled glandular hairs which secrete a pale yellow farina during frond enlargement. Stipe to 34 cm long, glossy, dark brown or purple-brown to black when mature and (in Cape York Peninsula) of milky appearance at maturity due to remains of glandular hairs. Rachises similar in colour and glossiness. Lamina 2–4-pinnate, ovate to narrowly triangular, 12–42 cm long, 8–30 cm wide. Pinnae ovate to triangular. Pinnules flabellate, rarely round; distal margins shallowly lobed; lobe margins denticulate when sterile, otherwise entire; small whitish nodosity usually present on rachis at junction with pinnule stalk; stalks not articulated. Sori 1–7 along distal margins, 1 or 2 per lobe; soral flaps round to reniform, usually at base of a deep often narrow sinus on pinnule margin. Spores 64 per sporangium, with largest diam. (27.6–) 40.3 (–54.7) µm.
Terrestrial in open or less commonly closed forest, on creek and river banks or on steep slopes, often among rocks; occasionally lithophytic in sandstone gorges; in far-northern (monsoonal) Australia, terrestrial along water-courses in gallery forest or beside springs in monsoon vine thicket; occasionally lithophytic on sandstone in similar situations.
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