Cheilanthes sieberi

Pteridaceae

Cheilanthes sieberi Kunze

Link to Australian Plant Name Index for publication details and synonyms: https://id.biodiversity.org.au/name/apni/62485

Fronds to 35 cm long and 3.5 cm wide; stipe and rachis dark brown or red-brown, glabrous or with sparse to moderately dense hairs (to 10 cells, often twisted and glandular), densest at stipe-rachis-rachilla junctions, with some scales. Lamina linear-lanceolate or ovate, 3-pinnate at base, 2-pinnate for most of length; larger pinnae triangular-ovate; pinnules lanceolate, ovate or elliptic; margins deeply incised, inrolled; upper and lower surfaces glabrous or with twisted hairs. Spores spherical, verrucose, with varying amounts of globular, branched or reticulate deposits; either black, ridged, 49–73 µm diam. and 16 per sporangium, or brown, trilete, 36–52 µm diam. and 32 per sporangium. 

Found in all states of Australia except Tas and the ACT. Also in New Zealand and New Caledonia.

Terrestrial in soil pockets and rock cracks, usually in rocky areas in open woodland.

A species with two subspecies distinguished by lamina indument. Reported to poison stock (S.L. Everist, Poisonous Pl. Austral. 2nd edn, 1981).