• Home
  • Contact
  • Site Map
George Weigel - Central PA Gardening
  • Landscape 1
  • Landscape 2
  • Landscape 3
  • Landscape 4
  • Garden Drawings
  • Talks & Trips
  • Patriot-News/Pennlive Posts
  • Buy Helpful Info

Navigation

  • Storage Shed (Useful Past Columns)
  • About George
  • Sign Up for George's Free E-Column
  • Plant Profiles
    • Annuals
    • Edibles
    • Roses
    • Bulbs/Corms/Tubers
    • Evergreens/Conifers
    • Flowering shrubs
    • Ornamental Grasses
    • Perennials
      • Amsonia (blue star)
      • Foamybells 'Alabama Sunrise'
      • Dianthus Firewitch
      • Campanula Blue Clips
      • Japanese painted fern
      • Creeping sedum 'Angelina'
      • Aster 'Lady in Black'
      • Crested iris
      • Salvia 'Marcus'
      • Euphorbia 'Bonfire'
      • Ligularia 'Britt-Marie Crawford'
      • Hosta 'Sagae'
      • Phlox 'Jeana'
      • Baptisia 'Purple Smoke'
      • Coralbells 'Electra'
      • Hosta 'June'
      • Creeping sedum 'Tricolor'
      • Variegated Solomon's seal
      • Foamybells 'Sweet Tea'
      • Lenten rose 'HGC Pink Frost'
      • Foamybells 'Tapestry'
      • Dwarf catmint
      • Astilbe 'Visions'
      • Coneflower PowWow 'Wild Berry'
      • Maidenhair fern
      • Goldenrod Little Lemon
      • Dwarf Shasta daisy
      • Indian pinks
      • Coralbells 'Bronze Wave'
      • Mountain mint
      • Christmas fern
      • Creeping sedum 'John Creech'
      • Liriope Purple Explosion
      • Dwarf Russian sages
      • Hardy begonia
      • Betony 'Hummelo'
      • Ornamental onion 'Summer Beauty'
      • Brunnera 'Silver Heart'
      • Lily 'Forever Susan'
      • Butterfly weed
      • Blazing star
      • Phlox 'Shortwood'
      • Allegheny spurge
      • Toad lily
      • Aromatic aster
      • Salvia 'Caradonna'
      • Candytuft
      • Sweet woodruff
      • Lavender 'Phenomenal'
      • Anemone Wild Swan and Dreaming Swan
      • Hardy hibiscus 'Midnight Marvel'
      • Black-eyed susan 'American Gold Rush'
      • Ornamental onion 'Millenium'
      • Aster Kickin' series
      • Sedum SunSparkler series
      • Autumn fern 'Brilliance'
      • Salvia Sensation Compact Deep Blue
      • Goat's beard 'Misty Lace'
      • Phlox 'Minnie Pearl'
      • Coneflower Sombrero series
      • Yarrow Little Moonshine
      • Hens and chicks Chick Charms
      • Giant hyssop 'Blue Fortune'
      • Coralbells Primo 'Black Pearl'
      • Montauk daisy
      • Peony 'Bartzella'
      • Lily-of-the-Nile (Agapanthus)
      • Lamium 'Purple Dragon'
      • Hardy hibiscus Summerific Series
      • Creeping sedum 'Atlantis'
      • Goldenrod 'Little Miss Sunshine'
      • Hardy geranium 'Azure Rush'
      • Hardy ginger
      • Turtlehead
      • Rodgersia (Rodger's flower)
      • Culver’s root (Veronicastrum)
      • English Lavender ‘Imperial Gem’
      • Aralia ‘Sun King’
      • Ironweed ‘Summer’s Swan Song’
      • False Sunflower ‘Bleeding Hearts’ (Heliopsis)
      • Japanese Anemone ‘Andrea Atkinson’
      • Eastern Beebalm
      • Creeping sedum 'Little Miss Sunshine'
      • Bear's breeches
      • Bee balm 'Purple Rooster'
      • Calamint
      • Aster 'Bluebird'
      • Woodland phlox 'Blue Moon'
      • Bowman's root 'Pink Profusion'
      • Goat's beard
      • Beardtongue (Penstemon)
      • Coneflower Artisan Yellow Ombre
      • White wood aster
      • Aster 'Grape Crush'
      • Foamflower 'Brandywine'
      • Fringe-leaf bleeding heart
      • Astilbe 'Pumila'
      • Barrenwort
      • Brunnera 'Jack Frost'
      • Catmint 'Walker's Low'
      • Centaurea 'Amethyst in Snow'
      • Coneflower Big Sky series
      • Coneflower 'Coconut Lime'
      • Coneflower 'Pink Double Delight'
      • Coralbells 'Citronelle'
      • Coralbells 'Caramel'
      • Coralbells 'Gypsy Dancer'
      • Coreopsis 'Zagreb'
      • Goldenrod 'Golden Fleece'
      • Euphorbia Helena's Blush'
      • Foamybells 'Stoplight'
      • Foamflower 'Sugar and Spice'
      • Gaillardia 'Goblin'
      • Gaillardia 'Oranges and Lemons'
      • Hardy geranium 'Biokovo'
      • Hardy geranium Rozanne
      • Hosta 'Krossa Regal'
      • Lamium 'Pink Chablis'
      • Lamium 'White Nancy'
      • Leadwort
      • Lenten rose
      • Liriope 'Big Blue'
      • Old-fashioned bleeding heart
      • Russian sage 'Little Spire'
      • Salvia 'May Night'
      • Sedum 'Autumn Joy'
      • Sedum 'Neon' and 'Brilliant'
      • Variegated liriope
      • Veronica 'Waterperry Blue'
    • Trees
    • Vines
  • Timely Tips
  • George’s Handy Lists
  • George's Friends
  • Photo Galleries
  • Links and Resources
  • Support George’s Efforts


George’s new “50 American Public Gardens You Really Ought to See” e-book steers you to the top gardens to add to your bucket list.

Read More | Order Now





George’s “Pennsylvania Month-by-Month Gardening” helps you know when to do what in the landscape.

Read More | Order Now







George’s “Survivor Plant List” is a 19-page booklet detailing hundreds of the toughest and highest-performing plants.

Click Here






Has the info here been useful? Support George’s efforts by clicking below.




Looking for other ways to support George?

Click Here

Christmas fern

* Common name: Christmas fernChristmas.fernH

* Botanical name: Polystichum acrostichoides

* What it is: A native fern that grows in loosely arching clumps of leathery, lance-shaped foliage. Christmas fern is evergreen and so offers winter interest in addition to lush green growth all growing season. Deer don’t like it, and neither do bugs, rabbits or groundhogs. Won a 2013 Gold Medal Award from the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society as a perennial deserving greater use in the regional landscape.

* Size: 2 feet tall, spreading 2 feet wide and beyond.

* Where to use: Adapts both to dry and damp sites but prefers shade or least shade in the afternoon. An ideal choice as a woodland groundcover or for colonizing a big, shady bank or ravine.

* Care: Keep well watered the first full season until roots establish. Then a weekly soaking is helpful in hot, dry weather but not necessary for survival. Ferns will brown and die back in a drought but usually grow back when rain returns – or the following season. Fertilizer usually not needed. Dig and divide in early spring to expand the planting or control its spread, which isn’t overly aggressive. Clip off any ratty foliage as needed.

* Great partner: None needed. Looks best in its own colony. But wide-leafed shade plants such as hosta, coralbells and/or ligularia make good perennial neighbors.


  • Home
  • Garden House-Calls
  • George's Talks & Trips
  • Disclosure

© 2025 George Weigel | Site designed and programmed by Pittsburgh Web Developer Andy Weigel using WordPress