Athyriaceae
Terrestrial or rock crevice-dwelling ferns. Rhizome often thick and stout, covered in papery scales attached by basal margin. Fronds close together, often tufted. Stipe with scales crowded near base, scattered above. Lamina thin-textured, simply pinnate to 3-pinnate; rachises and midribs rounded below, flattened above, usually grooved; veins free. Sori variable in shape, often elongate with some paired; indusium either a narrow flap, J-shaped, or inflated and oblong, round or ovate; spores bilateral.
6–13 genera; 3 of them represented in Victoria.
Members of the Athyriaceae have in the past sometimes been included in a more broadly circumscribed Dryopteridaceae (e.g. Brownsey et al. 1985; Brownsey & Smith-Dodsworth 1989). More recently Smith et al. (2006) subsumed Athyriaceae within Woodsiaceae, which however is not followed by most pteridophyte authorities.
Spinning
