Hymenophyllum flabellatum Labill.

Rhizome wiry, branched, 0.3–0.8 mm diam., tan-coloured, with opaque villous hairs but tomentose at the stipe junction. Fronds 2.5–35 (–60) cm long, usually pendulous. Stipe wiry, flexuose, 0.5–17 cm long, unwinged, with scattered hairs extending along the main rachis. Lamina very variable in size and shape, oblong-linear to ovate-lanceolate (dwarfed fronds often broadly triangular to round), 2–29 cm long, 1–6.5 cm wide, pale or yellow-green; primary division pinnate in the lower part, deeply pinnatifid above; pinnae or primary laminal segments oblique, 1–3-pinnatifid, flabellate, ovate or rhombic; rachis unwinged except toward apex. Ultimate segments linear, 0.5–2.2 mm wide, ± glabrous; margins entire, 1 (or 2)-cells thick; apex obtuse, sometimes notched. Sori numerous; involucre ovate to round, bilabiate to below the middle, 0.5–1.3 (–2) mm long, 0.5–1.5 (–2) mm wide; base broadly and shallowly cuneate; margins entire; receptacle included or slightly exserted.

Commonly grows on sandstone or as an epiphyte, often on the trunks of Nothofagus moorei, Eucalyptus nitens and Dicksonia antarctica in temperate rainforest and montane tropical rainforest.