Dwarf Tree Fern Blechnum gibbum Silver Lady

Silver Lady is the dwarf tree fern landscapers reach for when a full sized tree fern would swallow the space. It builds a tight, symmetrical rosette of glossy, upright, ladder like fronds, and over several years lays down a short black fibrous trunk beneath them, so an established plant reads as a miniature tree fern. That combination of small scale and true trunk is why it ends up in shaded courtyards, beside a covered entry, or in a wide pot where it can be looked down into.

Growing Silver Lady in Australian shade

It is a subtropical fern, so it belongs in warm temperate and subtropical gardens and is frost tender in cooler districts, where a container that can be shifted under a verandah for winter is the safer plan. Give it bright shade with no direct midday sun, shelter from wind, and soil built up with compost and leaf litter so it holds moisture while still draining. In a pot, use a mix with bark in it rather than a dense potting soil. The failure mode is drying out, and it happens from the air as much as the soil: hot dry wind, an air conditioning outlet or a heated indoor room will brown and crisp the frond tips within days, and two spotted mite moves in underneath the damaged fronds soon after. The trunk itself must stay damp, so wet the trunk and the root zone in summer rather than only the surface of the mix, and mulch around the base. Do not let water sit in the crown where the new fronds unfurl, which rots the growing point on a plant kept indoors or in still air. A pebble tray does more than misting indoors. Morning sun on a humid coastal side of the house is fine. Hard afternoon sun anywhere in Australia is not.

Silver Lady or a strappy alternative

Nothing else in this range gives you a trunk at this scale, which is the whole point of buying it. The closest cross shop is Blue Flax Lily, which will also fill a shaded bed under trees, but it is a low water, spreading, strappy plant that shrugs off dry spells and covers ground fast. Choose Dianella for coverage and drought tolerance, and Silver Lady for a single sculptural plant in a spot you can keep humid and watered. If the courtyard you are filling actually gets hard afternoon sun and reflected heat off render, neither is the answer, and Agave Blue Glow is the pot specimen to look at instead. The rest of the fern range is worth a look if you want more frond texture in the same bed.

Trimming a fern that will not shed

Old fronds do not drop cleanly off this one. Cut them at the base with secateurs once they yellow, and never pull, because tearing at the crown opens the growing point to rot. Work through the plant a couple of times a year rather than stripping it bare in one go, since the fronds shade the trunk. Feed lightly and often instead of heavily: a slow release fertiliser formulated for ferns or indoor plants in early spring, topped up in midsummer, plus liquid seaweed through the growing season. Strong doses of high nitrogen fertiliser scorch the roots of a plant this fine rooted. Refresh the mulch each spring so the trunk base never bakes dry.

Choosing a size

This plant is available in 13 sizes, from 66mm Square up to 400mm, priced from $16.95 to $269.00 per plant. The size shown is the pot the plant arrives in, which is the rootball, not the height of the plant. The smaller pots hold younger plants that cost less each and establish quickly, which suits hedges, screens and mass planting where the plant count adds up. The larger sizes carry several more years of growth on the farm and give height and presence straight away, which is what you want for a single feature position or a screen that cannot wait. Not sure which to choose? Read our guide to when to plant in Australia.