Plants up to 1 m tall. Rhizome erect or obliquely ascending, stout, densely scaly. Fronds caespitose; stipe amber, much shorter than lamina, densely scaly; scales pale brown to dark brown, glossy, ovate-lanceolate or narrowly lanceolate, 1-3 cm, membranous or papery, sparsely dentate, lower scales larger, gradually narrowed upward, upper scales linear to subulate, twisted; lamina oblong to oblanceolate, 50-120 × 15-30 cm, bipinnate-pinnatifid, base narrowed, apex abruptly acuminate; pinnae often more than 30 pairs, linear-lanceolate, 8-15 × 1.5-3 cm, sessile, pinnae gradually shortened toward both ends, lower pinnae distinctly shortened; segments approximate, oblong, 0.8-1.5 cm × 2-5 mm, margin shallowly obtuse-dentate or subentire, apex rounded or obtuse. Lamina thinly to thickly papery; rachis clothed with linear to lanceolate, contorted, ferruginous scales, costa clothed with ovate-lanceolate, long-ciliate scales, both surfaces and margins of segments with sparse, contorted scales and fibrillose scales; veins pinnate, forked or rarely simple. Sori abaxial on upper 1/3-1/2 of segment on abaxial veinlets, 1-4 pairs on each segment; indusia brown, orbicular-reniform, subentire, membranous, not completely covering sorus. n = 41.

Forests, hills. Hebei, Heilongjiang, Jilin, Liaoning [Japan, Korea, Russia].