The Six Dwarf Platycerium willinckii Cultivars Taiwan Calls the Divine Beasts

The six dwarf cultivars

Jenny, Golden Boy, Nano, OMG, Jade Girl, and Bacteria — six dwarf selections of Platycerium willinckii, the Javanese staghorn fern. Each grows a size smaller than the wild species with finer frond detail, and together they're the group Taiwan's collector scene talks about as a set more than as six separate names. All six are trade names circulating in the market, not officially registered cultivars.

Where the name comes from

Taiwan's "six divine beasts" is a term that grew out of the collector community itself. No one can trace it to a first use or a first year, and there's no registry or institution behind it. Different sources list the six names with small variations — which is the point: this is a consensus, not a formal classification.

Jade Girl and Golden Boy: according to the selector himself

The story behind Jade Girl and Golden Boy comes from Facebook posts by the Taiwanese selector 黃源 himself, cited in a PlatyWiki entry. Between 2016 and 2017, Huang, through a contact in the Indonesian grower scene, tracked down a batch of dwarf P. willinckii individuals that also included OMG and Nano. Jade Girl was first bought by another grower; Huang later bought it back and named it after admiring its fine fronds and heavy silver indumentum.

Golden Boy came from the same find, but this part of the story deserves a caveat — the PlatyWiki entry itself notes that "the following account is an unverified retelling from the internet." Anyone tracing provenance closely should factor that in before buying.

Jenny: according to grower-circle records

Jenny comes from the Thai breeder known as Mr. Yot, named after his daughter. This lineage rests on a single source; Mr. Yot's full identity and nursery records could not be traced beyond that.

Nano and Bacteria: no individual history on record

Both Nano and Bacteria are part of this same group, but who selected them and when is untraceable. Both have also become far more common through sporeling and tissue-culture propagation in recent years, and prices for both have come down noticeably as a result.

What to check before buying

The differences between dwarf cultivars show up in frond detail — a juvenile plant won't show it; wait for a mature specimen. The same cultivar name doesn't guarantee the same origin. Before buying, ask whether it's a pup, sporeling, or tissue-cultured plant, and who the mother plant is. The more a name circulates, the more its use on listings tends to blur — see how to read plant listings. Unclear provenance is also part of why these plants hold their value — rarity and story tend to move together.