Pellaea atropurpurea(L.) Link

purple-stem cliffbrake

WFO wfo-0001109208 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h

Pellaea atropurpurea, photographed by Ryan Sorrells
fig. a Ryan Sorrells, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-04-26 / obs. 191165402
Pellaea atropurpurea, photographed by Ryan Sorrells
fig. b Ryan Sorrells, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 191166888
Pellaea atropurpurea, photographed by Reid Hardin
fig. c Reid Hardin, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 196077229
Pellaea atropurpurea, photographed by Ryan Sorrells
fig. d Ryan Sorrells, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 191166508
Pellaea atropurpurea, photographed by mefisher
fig. e mefisher, CC0 1.0 / obs. 197374108
Pellaea atropurpurea, photographed by Gus
fig. f Gus, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 182800776
Pellaea atropurpurea, photographed by Elias
fig. g Elias, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 182761320
Pellaea atropurpurea, photographed by Brian Finzel
fig. h Brian Finzel, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 183794471

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.

Confused withby our own model

These are not lookalikes we guessed at. Each one is a species our identification model genuinely mistook for this plant, and how many times. The error rate is published.

Also published as 20 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.

  • Allosorus atropurpureus Kuntze
  • Asplenium atropurpureum Bernh.
  • Cassebeera atropurpurea (L.) Farw.
  • Cassebeera atropurpurea var. minima Farw.
  • Hemionitis atropurpurea (L.) Christenh.
  • Notholaena atropurpurea Keyserl.
  • Pellaea atropurpurea f. bifida Hahne
  • Pellaea atropurpurea f. furcata Hahne
  • Pellaea atropurpurea var. cristata Trel.
  • Pellaea atropurpurea var. latifolia Pickett
  • Pellaea atropurpurea var. minima Eggert ex Farw.
  • Pellaea atropurpurea var. mucronata (Fée) E.Fourn.
  • Pellaea atropurpurea var. nana (Richardson ex Franklin) Hook.
  • Pellaea atropurpurea var. punctata Gilbert
  • Pellaea atropurpurea var. venosa Gilbert
  • Pellaea mucronata Fée
  • Pellaea spiculata Fée
  • Platyloma atropurpureum J.Sm.
  • Pteris atropurpurea L.
  • Pteris spiculata Schkuhr

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.

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