Dryopteris marginata Christ

Plants up to 1.7 m tall. Rhizome stout, creeping, densely clothed with lanceolate, dark brown scales. Fronds strictly caespitose, approximate; stipe stramineous, stout, ca. 80 cm, ca. 1 cm in diam., base densely scaly; scales dark brown, oblong, ca. 3.5 × 1 cm, margin entire, apex acuminate; lamina deltoid-ovate, ca. 90 cm, base ca. 80 cm wide, twice pinnate-pinnatipartite, apex acuminate; pinnae ca. 10 pairs, remote, basal 1 or 2 pairs ovate-lanceolate, ca. 40 cm, widest at base, ca. 20 cm wide, with stalk ca. 2 cm, apex long acuminate; pinnules 12-14 pairs, oblique, remote, lanceolate, basal ones ca. 10 × 2.5 cm, base truncate, with stalk ca. 0.5 cm, apex acuminate; segments (tripinnate pinnules) ca. 10 pairs, oblique, remote, oblong, margin incised, apex obtuse, with deltoid teeth, base connected to costa by a narrow wing; pinnae above middle of lamina oblong, sessile, apex bluntly acuminate. Lamina herbaceous; rachis and costa subglabrous, sparsely clothed with lanceolate, pale brown scales and nodose, moniliform scales; veins pinnate, obscure adaxially, apex with hydathode, raised abaxially, conspicuous. Sori in 1 regular row on each side of center of pinnule or segment, not close to costa or costule; indusia ferruginous, orbicular-reniform, entire, persistent.

It is a tropical plant. In southern China it grows in forests and near streams between 900-2,400 m above sea level.

The fronds are cooked as a vegetable.