Nephrodium barbigerum T. Moore ex Hooker, Sp. Fil. 4: 113. 1862; Aspidium barbigerum (T. Moore ex Hooker) Christ; Dryopteris falconeri (Hooker) Kuntze; Lastrea barbigerum (T. Moore ex Hooker) Beddome; L. falconeri (Hooker) Beddome; N. falconeri Hooker.

Plants 60-80 cm tall. Rhizome caespitose, rhizome and stipe base densely clothed with ovate or oblong-lanceolate, ferruginous scales. Fronds caespitose; stipe 20-30 cm, up to 1 cm in diam., densely clothed with scales and brown, fibrillose scales; lamina ovate or oblong-lanceolate, bipinnate-pinnatifid, not narrowed to base, apex obtuse; pinnae more than 20 pairs, lanceolate, ca. 13 × 3 cm, obtuse, shortly stalked; pinnules ca. 20 pairs, oblong, apex rounded; segments dentate, remote, reflexed when dried. Lamina: rachis, costa, and costule all densely clothed with brown fibrillose scales and narrowly lanceolate scales; veins distinct on both surfaces. Sori 1 on each pinnule, on each side of costule; indusia ferruginous, orbicular-reniform, often early deciduous.

Dryopteris barbigera is dominant in thicket-grasslands in the forest zone in W Sichuan, S and SE Xizang, and N Yunnan.

Thickets, grasslands, slopes; 3600-4700 m. Qinghai, Sichuan, Yunnan [Bhutan, N India, Kashmir, Nepal].