Asian natives, Asian perennials, Asian woodland perennial, botanic garden, Dwarf Plants, evergreen, evergreen fern, evergreen foliage, evergreen groundcover, Evergreen Perennials, evergreens for shade, Fern, fern plant, fern plants, ferns, ferns for sale, ferns for shade, ground cover for shade, groundcover, groundcover plants, groundcovers, hardy ferns, JLBG, juniper level botanic garden, outdoor ferns, Plant Delights Nursery, shade ferns, Taiwan native, Tony Avent, Woodland Garden, woodland groundcover, Woodland Plants, zone 7b
One of our most amazing dwarf ferns is our 2008 Taiwanese spore collection of Microsorum brachylepis ‘Datun’. Our garden patch pictured below, which is looking great this month, was planted outdoors in 2017, and is now 4″ tall x 3′ wide. We offered this personal favorite a few years through Plant Delights, but the sales were rather miserable…what a shame. This delightful evergreen makes a superb, dense groundcover. Hardiness is Zone 7b-10b.
I can think of a few spots I could use that. Charming little thing. I wonder if the questionable hardiness notes in your catalog description scared folks off purchasing it when you offered it a few years ago? I know if I read the hardiness was 8B south, I wouldn’t have bought it for my 7B garden except as a houseplant. But now that it’s been growing outdoors in your JLBG garden for 5 years, how would you rate the hardiness now? Maybe it would do better with an updated hardiness ranking?
We haven’t had a Zone 7b winter in over 5 years, so we still don’t have any updated winter hardiness data. We’ve love to hear from anyone who has had this survive outdoors single digits F.
I’d love to try it.
Where in Taiwan was this collected? On the limestone mountain areas in the east? (Hualien, Taroko Gorge)
Mt. Datun in the Yangmingshan region north of Taipei.