From delicate maidenhair to bold royal ferns, there is a fern for every shade situation. A field guide for the fern-curious gardener.
Ferns are the backbone of a shade garden, and yet most gardens grow two kinds at most. There are thousands, and the range of texture, scale and tolerance among them is remarkable. Whatever your shade — dry, damp, deep, dappled — there is a fern that will look as though it grew there on purpose.
For dry shade
Dry shade is the hardest condition in gardening. The best ferns for it are the tough, leathery ones: Polystichum (shield ferns), Dryopteris filix-mas (male fern) and Asplenium scolopendrium (hart's tongue). All are evergreen or semi-evergreen, tolerate root competition, and look good in the depths of winter. Water them through their first summer and they will manage thereafter.
For damp shade
Where the soil stays moist, the range opens up. Osmunda regalis (royal fern) is a magnificent thing — a metre and a half of bright green, with rusty fertile fronds in summer. Athyrium filix-femina (lady fern) is delicate and easy, and Matteuccia struthiopteris (shuttlecock fern) spreads enthusiastically if it is happy. Give it room.
For the smallest corners
The maidenhair fern, Adiantum, is the most beautiful and the most demanding: it wants constant moisture and no direct sun, and it sulks dramatically when unhappy. Grow it in a pot where you can control the water, or in a shady, damp corner that never dries out. When it is happy, nothing else looks like it.
Planting, the simple version
Ferns have shallow roots and detest being buried deep. Plant them so the crown sits at soil level, water well, and mulch with leaf mould. Do not fertilise — ferns evolved in low-fertility woodland and rich feeding makes them floppy. Cut old fronds back in late winter, before the new croziers unfurl.
The unfurling
The great annual event of the fern garden is the unfurling of the croziers in spring: tight green spirals that open over a fortnight into full fronds. Plant ferns where you will see this happen, close to a path or a window. It is a small, reliable wonder, and it happens every year.