Thelypteris sect. Metathelypteris H. Itô in Nakai & Honda, Nov. Fl. Jap. 4: 137. 1939.

Plants small to medium-sized, terrestrial. Rhizomes short, decumbent, ascending or erect, rarely long creeping, covered with brown lanceolate scales and glaucous short hairs or subglabrous. Fronds approximate or clustered; stipes ± dark brown at bases, distally stramineous, glabrous or sparsely hairy; laminae oblong, lanceolate, or ovate-triangular, pinnate-pinnatifid, rarely tripinnate, if latter then pinnules separated from each other, never connected with narrow wing along costae, apices acuminate and pinnatifid. Laminae herbaceous or thinly herbaceous, when dry usually green, both surfaces ± with grayish white unicellular (rarely multicellular) acicular hairs, hairs denser along rachises and costae, pinnae usually glandless abaxially, rarely orange-red spherical glandular, costae rounded and raised adaxially, never grooved. Veinlets pinnate, simple or forked, oblique distally, not reaching margins. Sori small, orbicular, attached above middle of veinlets; indusia medium-sized, orbicular-reniform, each attached at a sinus, membranous, usually green, when dry grayish yellow or brownish, persistent. Spores bilateral, perispores corrugate, usually foveolate; exospore with finely reticulate surfaces. x = 35.

The following taxon is excluded from the present treatment, pending further research: Metathelypteris glandulosa H. G. Zhou & H. Li (Acta Bot. Yunnan. 14: 34. 1992), described from Guangxi.

About 12 species: S Asia, S China to Japan, Madagascar, Malesia; 11 species (five endemic) in China.

(Authors: Lin Youxing (林尤兴); Kunio Iwatsuki)