Polypodium cambricum ‘Richard Kayse’  

This is a lovely polypody fern with deeply divided foliage, a beautiful fern that’s easy and tough but with a fantastic story.

It was Discovered by a Mr Richard Kayse of Bristol in 1668 on a cliff outside Cardiff, the fern is sterile so can only be propagated by division. At some point over the interveening centuries the fern disappeared from cultivation and was forgotten about. Until Martin Rickard (fern expert extraordinaire) rediscovered it growing on the same cliff in 1980. Because it is sterile and can't reproduce through spores it had to be the same plant. A piece of rhizome was removed, grown on and split until years later I got hold of a piece. The plant I now sell in the nursery is part of the same plant found in 1668, of course no one knows when it grew it grew from a spore before that and how old the plant is, but if you buy one you a growing a plant that is at least 400 and could be thousands of years old

The fronds are evergreen so stay around for winter and will grow to around 45cm high.

Familly: Polypodiaceae
Genus: Polypodium
Species: Cambricum
Cultivar: Richard Kayse
Origin: Wales, Dinas Powys
Care: moist shade or partial shade.
Hardiness: fully hardy