Microsorum scandens (G.Forst.) Tindale

Epiphytic and terrestrial; creeping or climbing fern.  Rhizomes long-creeping, 2–4 mm diameter, wiry, scaly.  Rhizome scales clathrate, narrowly triangular in the upper part but abruptly widened to a broadly ovate base, 3–6 mm long, 0.5–2 mm wide (at base), squarrose, blackish-brown, entire.  Fronds 45–620 mm long.  Stipes 5–120 mm long, pale brown, glabrous or with scattered scales.  Laminae very varied, from undivided or variously lobed to deeply 1-pinnatifid; undivided laminae narrowly ovate to narrowly elliptic or linear, 40–430 mm long, 3–25 mm wide; lobed or pinnatifid laminae narrowly ovate to narrowly elliptic or occasionally ovate to elliptic, 110–540 mm long, 25–190 mm wide; lamina extending 10–160 mm below the lowest lobe, dull dark green, herbaceous, glabrous or with scattered scales along the costae.  Lamina lobes in 1–20 pairs, 15–105 mm long, 3–11 mm wide, straight or slightly falcate, acuminate, margins entire or wavy, widest at base.  Veins reticulate, forming 1–2 series of areoles between costa and lobe margin; hydathodes usually inconspicuous on adaxial surface of lamina.  Sori round or slightly elongate, 1–3 mm long, superficial or impressed into lamina forming low bulges on adaxial surface, in 1 row close to lobe margin on either side of the costa; paraphyses absent; exindusiate.

This species can be distinguished from the other species of Microsorum in New Zealand by its thin (< 4 mm diameter) wiry rhizome with small squarrose blackish-brown scales, thinner dull green laminae, occasional scales along the rachis and costae, and generally smaller sori.  It also has a musky scent when fresh, as reflected in its common name.

Occasional aberrant forms are found – either crested at the apices or with bifid laminae.

Creeping on the ground, over rocks or on banks, climbing trees, or epiphytic.  Common in a wide range of coastal and lowland scrub and forest, usually in damper habitats.

n = 37 (Brownlie 1958, as Microsorium pustulatum).

This fern has been widely misidentified by earlier New Zealand authors as Polypodium pustulatum, Phymatodes pustulata or Microsorium pustulatum (see Brownsey et al. 1985).