Notes

CONSERVATION Widespread; least concern (LC). An extremely variable species, in both size, leaf dissection and pinna shape. It seems likely there is more than one taxon involved, and/or hybridization; but for practical reasons, it is treated here as a single (‘sensu lato’) taxon. Plants from above 3000 m altitude have shorter stipes and pinnae, and rarely exceed 20 cm; plants growing on rocks are also usually rather small, and possibly plants exposed to full sun in such situations have the fronds less dissected. Braithwaite in Bot. J. Linn. Soc. 93: 343–378 describes four subspecies from South Africa, with a few references to East African material. The taxa are keyed out by agamospermy (subsp. filare A.F.Braithw.), leaf dissection and spore characters, and include subsp. tripinnatum (Baker) A.F.Braithw. and subsp. dodecaploideum A.F.Braithw. Chaerle, in his unpublished thesis on the afromontane Aspleniums, follows Braithwaite; I am unable to write a working key to these taxa and so prefer to keep this taxon as ‘sensu lato’ (if not latissimo) for the time being. I have added A. albersii to the synonymy; with some reluctance, as it presents a form that is reasonably distinct in the narrowly obovate segments. This form however does not key out, all its characters being within the range of variation of A. aethiopicum; nor is there a geographical or ecological gap. The A. albersii form occurs in K 7; T 3, 6, 7; and is found in moist forest between 900–2000 m. Two of its types, Buchwald 295 and Libusch s.n., are A. aethiopicum sensu stricto, and only the third represents the albersii facies. An added problem is that this brings A. buettneri even closer to the main aethiopicum group...AspleniumalbersiiHieron. var. eickii Hieron. is a synonym of A. linckii. The most closely related other species are the following:A. praegracile, distinguished by more finely dissected lamina and the creeping rhizome; A. blastophorum, distinguished by proliferous fronds; A. buettneri distinguished by its obovate, rounded pinnules; A. lividum distinguished by the sori in the wings along the rachis; A. uhligii and A. volkensii distinguished by their widely spaced fronds on a creeping rhizome. A plant from Kenya, K 3, Twins Hills [not traced], 00°15'S 36°35'E [which makes this N Aberdares], rock crevices at 3300 m, Sep. 1976, Schippers K369, has few and short pinnae with narrow lobes (about 1 mm wide) but the scale mixture of this taxon. I believe it to be an aberrant high-altitude form, but it looks strange enough to mention it as something to look out for.