Polytaenium feei(W.Schaffn. ex Fée) Maxon

straight lineleaf fern

WFO wfo-0001109279 Accepted WFO 2026-06 3 photographs CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–c · 1 observation

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 1 time, so some figures below are different views of the same plant, taken on the same day, rather than different individuals. They are usually different parts of it: the leaf, the flower, the bark.

Polytaenium feei, photographed by Lena Struwe
fig. a Lena Struwe, CC BY-SA 4.0 / 2016-07-03 / obs. 60760791
Polytaenium feei, photographed by Lena Struwe
fig. b Lena Struwe, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 60760789
Polytaenium feei, photographed by Lena Struwe
fig. c Lena Struwe, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 60760785

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 27 botanical countries

Regions where Polytaenium feei is native: Mexico Gulf, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Southeast, Mexico Southwest, Belize, Brazil Northeast, Brazil South, Brazil Southeast, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Leeward Is., Nicaragua, Panamá, Puerto Rico, Suriname, Trinidad-Tobago, Venezuela, Windward Is. Mexico GulfMexico NortheastMexico SoutheastMexico SouthwestBelizeBrazil NortheastBrazil SouthBrazil SoutheastColombiaCosta RicaCubaDominican RepublicEcuadorFrench GuianaGuatemalaGuyanaHaitiHondurasJamaicaNicaraguaPanamáPuerto RicoSurinameTrinidad-TobagoVenezuela Leeward Is.Windward Is.
Native distribution of Polytaenium feei, 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
Belize BLZ SOUTHERN AMERICA
Brazil Northeast BZE
Brazil South BZS
Brazil Southeast BZL
Colombia CLM
Costa Rica COS
Cuba CUB
Dominican Republic DOM
Ecuador ECU
French Guiana FRG
Guatemala GUA
Guyana GUY
Haiti HAI
Honduras HON
Jamaica JAM
Leeward Is. LEE
Nicaragua NIC
Panamá PAN
Puerto Rico PUE
Suriname SUR
Trinidad-Tobago TRT
Venezuela VEN
Windward Is. WIN
Mexico Gulf MXG NORTHERN AMERICA
Mexico Northeast MXE
Mexico Southeast MXT
Mexico Southwest MXS

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 36 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 17.8 °C 20.4 °C 22.4 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 26.4 °C 28.2 °C 30.2 °C
Annual rainfall 1,813 mm 2,108 mm 3,182 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 233 mm 307 mm 485 mm

It is not found anywhere that gets close to freezing. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 36 research-grade observations of Polytaenium feei 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 11 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.

  • Antrophyum feei W.Schaffn. ex Fée
  • Antrophyum lanceolatum (L.) Kaulf.
  • Antrophyum lanceolatum var. feei (W.Schaffn. ex Fée) Krug
  • Antrophyum stenophyllum Rovirosa
  • Dictyogramme lanceolata (L.) Trevis.
  • Hemionitis elongata Cav.
  • Hemionitis lanceolata L.
  • Polytaenium elongatum (Cav.) Pic.Serm.
  • Polytaenium feei var. lanceolatum (L.) Domin
  • Polytaenium feei var. schaffneri Domin
  • Polytaenium lanceolatum (L.) Benedict

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 ANLA8. 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.