I don’t know why I struggled with these two for so many years. Magical and soothing as they are, I think a lot of us mainly see ferns as different from flowers or trees–best viewed as an indistinct group. Oaks and maples and pine trees and birches are so distinct from each other – not just within genera but as species–yellow birch is yellow birch, sweet birch is sweet birch, etc.
On the other hand:
“What’s over there?”
“Dunno. Buncha ferns?”
Anyway, hay-scented ferns and New York ferns are not all that hard to tell apart.
Hay-scented ferns run to three feet high and colonizes densely, with a sticky or tacky lower stem. The overlapping fronds create waves and movement – I love the look of that kind of texture against rock as above against a random granite boulder. (We are rich in granite boulders.)
New York fern likes more shade and is significantly shorter – running to about twelve inches high. It appears in dense shade as drifts, sometimes clumping gently together, other times popping up amongst rocks and fallen leaves like little fern-ghosts.
Not quite a specimen fern, and I would not trust it as a ground cover, but it adds a sense of gentle wildness to a woodland garden. From a design standpoint, it’s a fern for vibes. From a life form standpoint it’s purpose
In any case I wish I had written down where I read this, but this is the best ID tip:
“New Yorkers burn a candle at both ends.”
New York ferns taper dramatically at both the top and bottom of the frond. Hay-scented ferns taper as well, but the taper is not as distinctive as on New York fern:
So there you have it; two more ferns kind of sorted out, mainly? Sure.