Polystichum subapiciflorum Hayata (1915: 335). Figure 5. Type:— Taiwan Island: Arishan, Hasegawa-kei, April 1914, T. Ito & B. Hayata s.n. (TAIF-1998!, TI). Polystichum subapiciflorum is often treated as a synonym of P. biaristatum (Blume 1828: 164) T. Moore (1858: 86) (e. g., Knapp 2011, Zhang & Barrington 2013, Hsu et al. 2019). However, P. subapiciflorum (Knapp 4182, P!) has rounded pinnule apex and medial sori, whereas P. biaristatum has acute pinnule apex and sori slightly closer to the midrib. Polystichum biaristatum occurs in SE and S Asia but neither in Taiwan nor Mainland China.

Published as part of Wan, Xia, Knapp, Ralf, Chen, De-Kui, He, Hai & Zhang, Li-Bing, 2023, Taxonomic notes on some East Asian pteridophytes, pp. 128-140 in Phytotaxa 597 (2) on page 132, DOI: 10.11646/phytotaxa.597.2.3, http://zenodo.org/record/7929279