耳状紫柄蕨 er zhuang zi bing jue

Gymnogramma aurita Hooker, Icon. Pl. 10: t. 974. 1854; Aspidium auritum (Hooker) Christ; Dryopteris aurita (Hooker) C. Christensen; Grammitis aurita (Hooker) T. Moore; Leptogramma aurita (Hooker) Beddome; Nephrodium auritum (Hooker) Handel-Mazzetti; Phegopteris aurita (Hooker) J. Smith; Polypodium auritum (Hooker) E. J. Lowe; Thelypteris aurita (Hooker) Ching.

Plants 40-100 cm tall. Rhizome long creeping, with scales at apex; scales brown, narrowly lanceolate, 3-4 mm, ciliate along margins. Fronds remote; stipe red-castaneous or brownish at least toward base, shiny, 20-60 cm; lamina ovate-lanceolate, 20-70 × 15-30 cm, slightly tapering to base, pinnate-pinnatifid, pinnatifid and acuminate at apex; pinnae 10-18 pairs, opposite, spreading, sessile, proximal 1 or 2 pairs of pinnae slightly shortened, lanceolate, distal pinnae 7-15 × 2-4 cm, bases hastate, asymmetrical, pinnatifid nearly to costae, apices acuminate, pinnae above middle ± symmetrical at base and adnate to rachis; segments (10-)15-20 pairs, spreading, basiscopic segments of pinnae longer than acroscopic ones, basal pair largest, particularly basiscopic one more oblique, lanceolate, 2.5-4 × 0.7-1 cm, margins pinnately lobed or crenate, apices acuminate, acroscopic ones shorter, parallel to rachis, oblong, 1-2 cm, entire or shallowly undulate, obtuse at apices. Veins visible abaxially, lateral veins forked or simple, 5-7 pairs per segment, basal pair arising from bases of costules. Laminae thickly herbaceous, drying brown-green, with short hairs along both sides of costae or only adaxially, laminae otherwise glabrous, rachises smooth abaxially, with dense short hairs adaxially. Sori oblong or sometimes ovate-orbicular, borne above middle of ultimate veinlets, far from costules, 2-5 pairs per segment. Sporangia each with hairs below annulus. 2n = 62, 124.

Forests beside streams on high mountains; 1200-2000 m. Chongqing, C Fujian, C Guizhou, S and W Jiangxi, SE Xizang, W Yunnan [Bhutan, NE India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, N Myanmar, Nepal, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, N Vietnam].

A widespread species, Pseudophegopteris aurita varies considerably in frond size, and hence in laminar dissection, over its range. Specimens outside of China tend to be considerably larger.