One of the most interesting ferns is interrupted fern. The wooly fiddleheads emerge in the spring and expand to form a beautiful vase shaped plant. The fern grows 2 to 5 Feet tall from creeping rhizomes. The spores are produced in the middle of the frond as they ripen and fall they leave a gap in the middle of the blade. Hence the name Interrupted Fern. The ferns form thick luscious stands in moist soil high in organic matter. This great plant can also tolerate drier soils.

One of the easier ferns to identify when the spores are on the frond, interrupted fern is a really attractive fern anytime of the year. Interrupted fern can be added to your woodland garden for filler after early spring flowering plants have stopped flowering or gone dormant. It is an elegant fern that really adds great color and form to your garden. Good companions are Jack-in-the-pulpit, cinnamon fern, Virginia water leaf, Virginia blue bells, trout lilies, wild columbine, wild ginger, early meadow rue and wild geranium.

Interrupted fern is relatively easy to grow from spores but unlike most other ferns the spores should not be stored but sown immediately. This is also true of Royal Fern and Cinnamon Fern. At Amanda's Garden we have found that sowing immediately produces robust plants in a year.