姬书带蕨 ji shu dai jue

Vittaria anguste-elongata Hayata, Icon. Pl. Formosan. 6: 161. 1916.

Rhizome slender, long creeping, ascending; scales yellow-brown, bright iridescent, linear-lanceolate, 5-7 mm, 0.2-0.3 mm wide at base, margin subentire, apex bristlelike, often with a glandlike head, marginal lumina wall thin, dark brown. Fronds clustered; stipe indistinct, slender, appressed, glabrous; lamina thinly herbaceous, brown when dry, linear, 8-30 × 0.2-0.4 cm, gradually narrowed to both ends, apex shortly acuminate or caudate; costa slender, indistinct abaxially, slightly raised adaxially, veins not evident. Soral line marginal, immersed in deep groove, open outward, fertile throughout; paraphyses many, long, with head obconic, ca. 2 × as long as wide. Spores monolete, oblong in outline, surface ornamentation obscure.

Epiphytic or epilithic; sea level to 1000 m (in Taiwan). Fujian, Hainan, Taiwan [Japan (Ryukyu Islands), Philippines].

Iwatsuki et al. (Fl. Japan 1: 87. 1995) treated Vittaria anguste-elongata as a synonym of V. ensiformis Swartz (Haplopteris ensiformis (Swartz) E. H. Crane), which is widely distributed in the Old World tropics. However, Knapp (Ferns Fern Allies Taiwan, 426, 482. 2011) reports that some populations in S Taiwan (southernmost tip of Ping Dong County) have a narrower, more leathery lamina and rhizome scales with fewer, larger cells than material of H. anguste-elongata from other areas in Taiwan and probably represent H. ensiformis s.s.