''Calochlaena'' is a genus of ferns within the family

Dicksoniaceae Dicksoniaceae is a group of tropical, subtropical and warm temperate ferns, treated as a family in the Pteridophyte Phylogeny Group classification of 2016 (PPG I), and counting 30-40 species. Alternatively, the family may be sunk into a very broa ...

. Although these ground ferns resemble

bracken Bracken (''Pteridium'') is a genus of large, coarse ferns in the family Dennstaedtiaceae. Ferns (Pteridophyta) are vascular plants that have alternating generations, large plants that produce spores and small plants that produce sex cells (eggs ...

, they are only distantly related. Five species are known from Melanesia, Polynesia and eastern Australia. ''

Calochlaena dubia ''Calochlaena dubia'', commonly known as soft bracken, false bracken, common ground fern or rainbow fern, is a small Australian fern in the treefern family Dicksoniaceae. It is very common within its range, and often seen growing under eucalyptu ...

'', is a common fern of the east coast of Australia. The name is derived from the

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

''kalos'' "beautiful" and ''chlaina'' "cloak", and refers to the soft hairs on the species. The genus was originally described by

William Ralph Maxon William Ralph Maxon, (February 27, 1877February 25, 1948) was an American botanist and pteridologist. He graduated from Syracuse University with a Bachelor of Philosophy, B.Ph. in biology, in 1898, and spent about one year at Columbia University do ...

as a subgenus of the fern genus '' Culcita'', but the differences were such that its members were raised to genus level, and are now considered to be in separate families. ''Culcita'' was restricted to two species, one from Mediterranean Europe and one from North America.

Species

Plants of the World Online Plants of the World Online (POWO) is an online database published by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. It was launched in March 2017 with the ultimate aim being "to enable users to access information on all the world's known seed-bearing plants by ...

as of recognizes the following species:

References

External links

* * Dicksoniaceae Fern genera {{Cyatheales-stub