Type

Flower · Perennial

Botanical family

Mixed / other

Foliage color

Green

Sunlight

Shade to half sun with wet feet

Watering

High

Soil

Moist to wet, acidic, rich in leaf mold

Feeding

Gentle all-organic

USDA zones

3a–9a

Frost tolerant

Yes

Plant out

at the last spring frost

Plant spacing

2 ft 6 in

In-row spacing

23.6 in

Between rows

2 ft 11 in

Square-foot density

Not suited to SFG

Root system

A creeping rhizome with wiry black roots

Working depth

4–12 in

Can reach

18 in down where the soil allows

Spread

3–6 ft across, about 1–2× the width of the plant

Shallowest pot

8 in of soil

The rhizome runs at the surface under leaf litter, which is exactly where a fern wants it: covered, damp and never disturbed. Bury it in soil and it rots, leave it bare and it dries, so leaf mould over the top is the whole of its cultivation.

The habit is Cinnamon fern’s own; the figures are what that habit usually comes to at this size, not a measurement of this species. Roots follow the soil either way: a compacted pan, a high water table or heavy clay stops them well short of any of it, and deep open ground lets them go further.

When

Not harvested here. The spring cleanup is the whole calendar.

What to look for

Last year's collapsed fronds flat around the new fiddleheads in April.

How to harvest

Clear the old fronds before the fiddleheads unfurl, and do not eat them: the edible fiddlehead of commerce is the ostrich fern, and this one is not it. Divide the slow woody crown only if you must, in early spring.

How often

One spring tidy. Division at most once a decade.

Storing the crop

Nothing to store. The hummingbirds take the fiddlehead wool; consider that the harvest.

• Generally trouble-free No notable pest or disease problems when grown in the right conditions — one of the easy ones.