184 
New Zealand Ferns 
(70) L. vulccinicci (from a volcanic district?). Most 
readily distinguished by the general outline of the frond, 
which is wedge-shaped, the lowest leaflets being the 
longest. A rather local fern. 
Description . — Root short, stout, woody, erect or inclined. 
Stalks 4 to 9 inches long, slender, pale yellowish-brown, clothed 
towards the base with dark-brown shining scales, smooth and 
polished above. Barren fronds 4 to 14 inches long, without the 
stalks, by 2 to 5 inches broad at the base, texture stiff, dull-green. 
Fertile fronds usually exceeding the barren. Seeds continuous. 
North and South Islands, Stewart Island. In dry open woods 
from Auckland and Coromandel southwards ; but often rare and 
local. More frequent in the sub-alpine forests of Nelson and 
Canterbury. Sea-level to 3,500 feet. 
I did not come across this fern until quite recently. 
When bicycling between Rotorua and Taupo, along a 
bad road and against a head wind through the dreary 
pumice country, I noticed a fern that struck me as 
strange growing about a rabbit hole. In a moment I 
was off the bicycle and held a frond in my hand. At a 
glance I saw it was “vulcanica.” Then it became almost 
abundant, hardly a day passed that I did not find it, 
usually growing on rocky banks near the edge of the 
bush — at Axatiatia, Tauhara, Otukou Pa, and Waima- 
rino. It extends northwards through Australia and the 
Pacific Islands to Malaya. 
