Polypodium appalachianumHaufler & Windham

Appalachian polypody

WFO wfo-0001114749 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Polypodium appalachianum, photographed by ladyjanaye
fig. a ladyjanaye, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-03-11 / obs. 182498296
Polypodium appalachianum, photographed by Ashwin Srinivasan
fig. b Ashwin Srinivasan, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 165611165
Polypodium appalachianum, photographed by John Abrams
fig. c John Abrams, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 107518123
Polypodium appalachianum, photographed by Étienne Lacroix-Carignan
fig. d Étienne Lacroix-Carignan, CC0 1.0 / obs. 108201569
Polypodium appalachianum, photographed by John Abrams
fig. e John Abrams, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 80133325
Polypodium appalachianum, photographed by Nick Kleinschmidt
fig. f Nick Kleinschmidt, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 70894858
Polypodium appalachianum, photographed by John Abrams
fig. g John Abrams, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 60735418
Polypodium appalachianum, photographed by JSReiff
fig. h JSReiff, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 50720306

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.

Native range 26 botanical countries

Regions where Polypodium appalachianum is native: Alabama, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Georgia, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Brunswick, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Newfoundland, North Carolina, Nova Scotia, Ohio, Ontario, Pennsylvania, Prince Edward I., Québec, Rhode I., South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia AlabamaConnecticutGeorgiaKentuckyMaineMarylandMassachusettsNew BrunswickNew HampshireNew JerseyNew YorkNewfoundlandNorth CarolinaNova ScotiaOhioOntarioPennsylvaniaPrince Edward I.QuébecSouth CarolinaTennesseeVermontVirginiaWest Virginia District of ColumbiaRhode I.
Native distribution of Polypodium appalachianum, 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
Alabama ALA NORTHERN AMERICA
Connecticut CNT
District of Columbia WDC
Georgia GEO
Kentucky KTY
Maine MAI
Maryland MRY
Massachusetts MAS
New Brunswick NBR
New Hampshire NWH
New Jersey NWJ
New York NWY
Newfoundland NFL
North Carolina NCA
Nova Scotia NSC
Ohio OHI
Ontario ONT
Pennsylvania PEN
Prince Edward I. PEI
Québec QUE
Rhode I. RHO
South Carolina SCA
Tennessee TEN
Vermont VER
Virginia VRG
West Virginia WVA

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 655 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low -15.0 °C -7.2 °C -1.2 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 20.6 °C 25.4 °C 29.3 °C
Annual rainfall 1,036 mm 1,312 mm 1,806 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 203 mm 275 mm 384 mm

It is found where winters bring hard frost. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 655 research-grade observations of Polypodium appalachianum 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 3 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.

  • Polypodium vulgare f. acuminatum (Gilbert) Fernald
  • Polypodium vulgare subsp. oreophilum Maxon
  • Polypodium vulgare var. oreophilum Maxon

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. Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. 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.