Western Sword Fern
Polystichum munitum
The signature evergreen fern of the Northwest forest floor, with bold, leathery, sword-shaped fronds in big shuttlecock clumps. Tough, long-lived, and the workhorse of shade gardens. Roots were roasted and peeled like potatoes as a famine food when little else was available — not a fiddlehead; sword fern's own fiddleheads are considered unpalatable and unsafe, unlike ostrich fern's.
- Family
- Dryopteridaceae
- Type
- fern
- Lifespan
- perennial
- Height
- 3.5–3.5 ft
- Spacing
- 2–4 ft apart
- Light
- part shade, shade
- Soil moisture
- moist
- Soil pH
- acidic, neutral
- Bloom colors
- brown
- Wildlife value
- mammals, songbirds
- Landscape uses
- border
- Native states
- AK, CA, ID, MT, OR, SD, WA