Plant guide : Asplenium scolopendrium
Botanical name: Asplenium scolopendrium
The gloriously glossy Asplenium scolopendrium (also known as Hart’s tongue fern) is a small evergreen fern, with deep green, shiny leaves. Unusually, the leaves have straight, strap-like edges, rather than the feathery, divided fronds we usually associate with a fern, which makes it the perfect contrast alongside traditional ferns.
It’s a low-maintenance plant and can get by with very little care and attention, but these tips will help to keep it looking its best throughout the year.
Plant type:
Evergreen fern
Lasts for a number of years and stays green throughout the winter.
Growing conditions:
In the wild, Asplenium can grow in a huge range of habitats, from lush woodland to rocky outcrops, which suggests how adaptable it is with growing conditions. It can survive in a range of soil types (even growing directly out of small pockets in walls, with hardly any soil at all) but does best in slightly alkaline conditions.
It prefers shade or part shade, and needs some level of constant moisture (though can also suffer easily from root rot in soggy areas, so be sure to incorporate drainage if necessary…)
It’s a plant we often use in fairly inhospitable areas – growing in walls (such as the picture below) or in deep shade as underplanting in woodland areas.
How to plant:
Easily purchased as a container-grown plant, plant asplenium out at any time of the year, as long as the soil is not water-logged or frozen.
Dig a hole to the depth of the container and twice as deep. Gently squeeze the sides of the pot to release the plant, and place into the hole. Backfill and gently firm in, watering well for the first season.
See our guide to planting out container grown plants for more info.
Care:
Once established, this is a low-maintenance plant that should need little care. Water regularly in any dry spells for the first six months after it is planted, while it establishes roots and gets settled.
Asplenium scolopendrium doesn’t need any regular pruning. However, if any leaves look tatty or become brown, you can remove them from the plant, by cutting them right back at the base to soil level.
A mulch around the base of the plant in Spring time can help to preserve moisture during the warmer months. When you mulch, take care not to pile the mulch right up to the crown of the plant, but leave an area of soil free, in order to prevent the mulch causing the plant to rot.
This is a fern that can be affected by rust in warm, mild winters. This shows as a powdery orange fungus growing on the leaves and causing the leaf to look as if it has been covered with orange rust. If you find this, cut back the affected leaves and dispose of them. The plant should recover fully by the Spring.
Grow with:
Aspleium is a perfect plant to grow alongside other ferns, as its thick, glossy, strap-like leaves contrast well with the more typically dissected, feathery fern foliage, but all will do well with similar growing conditions.
We also love to pair asplenium with other shade-loving flowering plants, and find it works especially well with glorious astilbes, providing a solid foil to offset their frothy flowerheads.
Also perfect to fill inhospitable gaps in hard landscaping, you can encourage Asplenium to grow amongst paving slabs, in walls, or in the smallest of planting pockets.
