Haplopteris elongata(Sw.) E.H.Crane

stiff shoestring fern

WFO wfo-0001252683 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Haplopteris elongata, photographed by Jacy Chen
fig. a Jacy Chen, CC BY 4.0 / 2021-11-20 / obs. 173480242

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

The specimen a real sheet, in a real collection

Herbarium
The New York Botanical Garden
Accession
192595
Filed as
Haplopteris elongata (Sw.) E.H.Crane
Det. by
D. H. Lorence; R. C. Moran 2003-01-01
Collected
A. Raynor 2001-03-21
Origin
FM
The sheet
View the digitised specimen (CC BY 4.0)

A real pressed plant, in a real collection, under the accession number above. Not an illustration of one. The holding institution does not serve this sheet’s image to third parties, so there is no photograph here. The record is real and the link goes to it. Where we hold no openly licensed sheet for a species this section is simply absent, and where a sheet never recorded who determined it, that field stays empty rather than being filled in. Roughly half of all herbarium sheets never recorded a determiner, which is ordinary.

Native range 49 botanical countries

Regions where Haplopteris elongata is native: Comoros, Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique, Seychelles, Tanzania, China South-Central, China Southeast, Hainan, Kazan-retto, Ogasawara-shoto, Taiwan, Tibet, Andaman Is., Assam, Bangladesh, Bismarck Archipelago, Borneo, Cambodia, Christmas I., East Himalaya, India, Jawa, Laos, Lesser Sunda Is., Malaya, Maluku, Myanmar, New Guinea, Philippines, Solomon Is., Sri Lanka, Sulawesi, Sumatera, Thailand, Vietnam, New South Wales, Norfolk Is., Queensland, Caroline Is., Cook Is., Fiji, Marquesas, New Caledonia, Santa Cruz Is., Society Is., Tokelau-Manihiki, Tubuai Is., Vanuatu KenyaMadagascarMozambiqueTanzaniaChina South-CentralChina SoutheastHainanTaiwanTibetAssamBangladeshBismarck ArchipelagoBorneoCambodiaEast HimalayaIndiaJawaLaosLesser Sunda Is.MalayaMalukuMyanmarNew GuineaPhilippinesSolomon Is.Sri LankaSulawesiSumateraThailandVietnamNew South WalesQueenslandFijiNew Caledonia ComorosSeychellesAndaman Is.Christmas I.Norfolk Is.Caroline Is.Cook Is.MarquesasSociety Is.Tokelau-ManihikiTubuai Is.Vanuatu
Native distribution of Haplopteris elongata, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows. Regions too small to draw at this scale are marked with a dot.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Andaman Is. AND ASIA-TROPICAL
Assam ASS
Bangladesh BAN
Bismarck Archipelago BIS
Borneo BOR
Cambodia CBD
Christmas I. XMS
East Himalaya EHM
India IND
Jawa JAW
Laos LAO
Lesser Sunda Is. LSI
Malaya MLY
Maluku MOL
Myanmar MYA
New Guinea NWG
Philippines PHI
Solomon Is. SOL
Sri Lanka SRL
Sulawesi SUL
Sumatera SUM
Thailand THA
Vietnam VIE
Caroline Is. CRL PACIFIC
Cook Is. COO
Fiji FIJ
Marquesas MRQ
New Caledonia NWC
Santa Cruz Is. SCZ
Society Is. SCI
Tokelau-Manihiki TOK
Tubuai Is. TUB
Vanuatu VAN
China South-Central CHC ASIA-TEMPERATE
China Southeast CHS
Hainan CHH
Kazan-retto KZN
Ogasawara-shoto OGA
Taiwan TAI
Tibet CHT
Comoros COM AFRICA
Kenya KEN
Madagascar MDG
Mozambique MOZ
Seychelles SEY
Tanzania TAN
New South Wales NSW AUSTRALASIA
Norfolk Is. NFK
Queensland QLD

Not drawn on the map: Kazan-retto, Ogasawara-shoto, Santa Cruz Is.. We hold no public-domain boundary for these regions, so they are listed rather than guessed at.

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Where it actually grows measured, from 497 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 6.8 °C 10.4 °C 20.3 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 23.6 °C 28.6 °C 30.6 °C
Annual rainfall 2,372 mm 4,215 mm 4,839 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 135 mm 549 mm 836 mm

It is barely found anywhere that freezes. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 497 research-grade observations of Haplopteris elongata that carry a coordinate, and this is the range those places actually span. The 5th and 95th percentiles are used rather than the minimum and maximum, because a single cultivated specimen in a heated conservatory should not widen a tropical plant's range to the Arctic.

This is not a hardiness zone. A USDA zone is the average annual extreme minimum temperature. The figure above is the mean daily minimum of the coldest month, which is a different quantity and is typically far warmer. Reading one as the other would place a plant several zones too warm, so we do not publish a hardiness zone, because we do not have one.

Also published as 35 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Oetosis elongata Greene
  • Pteris graminifolia Roxb.
  • Vittaria angustata Alderw.
  • Vittaria anodontolepis Fée
  • Vittaria blumei Hieron.
  • Vittaria bonincola H.Itô
  • Vittaria boninensis Christ
  • Vittaria crispomarginata Christ
  • Vittaria elongata Sw.
  • Vittaria elongata var. latifolia Holttum
  • Vittaria elongata var. samoensis Luerss.
  • Vittaria flaccida Hieron.
  • Vittaria formosana Nakai
  • Vittaria hildebrandtii Hieron.
  • Vittaria hildebrandtii var. major Hieron.
  • Vittaria intermedia Blume
  • Vittaria latissima Hieron.
  • Vittaria ledermannii Hieron.
  • Vittaria lloydiifolia Racib.
  • Vittaria nervosa Christ
  • Vittaria nymanii Hieron.
  • Vittaria pachystemma Christ
  • Vittaria parvula Bory
  • Vittaria pauciareolata Ching

and 11 more.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. USDA PLANTS Database. common name, checklist symbol VIEL3. public domain. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
  4. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.