| Description:
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Rhizome erect or shortly creeping, woody; rhizome scales pale brown with wide dark brown central midrib, linear-lanceolate in outline. Fronds tufted, 0.45–2.2 m long, with gemma at base of apical pinna. Stipe straw-coloured above, chestnut towards the base, 0.27–1.25 m long, slightly roughened with sharp hard points, scaly at the base. Lamina subcoriaceous, ovate or ovate-lanceolate in outline, up to 60 cm wide, bipinnatipartite. Pinnae (8–)10–15-jugate, oblong to oblong-lanceolate in outline, 15–35(–40) x 4–12(–15) cm; stalks of pinnae 0–1.5(–3) cm long, roughened with groups of small prickles in the axils with the main rhachis; segments of pinnae 12–25-jugate, narrowly lanceolate in outline, straight or slightly curved, 1.5–6(–9.5) x 0.5–0.9(–1.1) cm, the sterile apices crenate-serrate; terminal segment up to 11 x 0.8 cm. Veins free, simple or forked, the branches entering the base of sinuses closely approximate or occasionally actually connected by a cross-vein; rhachis deeply grooved; costae and costulae without spinules. Sori extending from sinuses to within 0.5–1.5 cm of the apex; paraphyses present. |