Matteuccia struthiopteris (L.) Tod., Ostrich Fern
Account Summary
Introduction, neophyte, garden escape or planted, very rare. Circumpolar boreal-montane, but absent as a native from most of W Europe.
9 April 2005; Northridge, R.H. & Northridge, Mrs H.J.; damp trackside on edge of woodland, Knocknabrass Td, Crom.
Fermanagh occurrence
A patch about five metres square of this large, distinctive deciduous fern with its tuft of fronds giving it an attractive shuttlecock appearance, was noticed growing, well established in damp ground below an untarred track at the edge of alder and willow scrub at Knocknabrass Td on the Crom estate. The spot is approximately 400 m NE of the present occupied castle and quite remote from any garden.
RHN collected a sample portion of the plant, including its stoloniferous base, and grew it on in a garden pot. Originally it was mistaken for Oreopteris limbosperma which it quite closely resembles, but in 2009 when the potted plant was fully developed RHN recognised it was this species.
Origin, ecology and history in cultivation
M. struthiopteris is a native fern of boreal and montane areas of central and eastern Europe, Asia and N America. It was introduced to garden cultivation in Britain and Ireland as long ago as 1760, and was first recorded in the wild in 1834 (T.D. Dines, in: Preston et al. 2002). As it tolerates shade and waterlogged soils of almost any pH, it has become a popular subject for water gardens in recent years. Instances of it occurring as a garden escape are quite frequent but widely scattered in Britain from Cornwall (VC 2) to N Ebudes in W Scotland (VC 104) (New Atlas).
Irish occurrence
In Ireland, it is of much rarer occurrence, the Catalogue of Alien Plants in Ireland listing just three VCs, Cos Leitrim, Antrim and Londonderry (H29, H39 & H40) (Reynolds 2002). Famously, two largish colonies spread from an abandoned garden at Shane's Castle, Antrim, into damp woodland at Massereene on the NE shore of Lough Neagh. These established patches of the fern, first discovered in 1948 by Carrothers, Moon and Davidson of Fermanagh Typescript Flora fame, survive and appear naturalised, competing with natural vegetation (FNEI 3). We expect the Crom plant will do the same.
Names
'Matteuccia', is named in honor of Carlo Matteucci (1800-1868), an Italian physicist. The Latinised epithet 'struthiopteris', from the Greek, 'strouqeios' or 'stroutheios', meaning "of an ostrich", and 'pteris', fern. The English common name 'Ostrich Fern' is from a supposed resemblance of the fronds to the plumes of the large flightless Afican bird. Alternative common names include 'Fiddlehead Fern', and the singularly uninspired 'Garden Fern' and 'Hardy Fern' (http://rook.org/earl/bwca/nature/ferns/matteuccia.html)(accessed Nov 2014).