Spores sourced from historic herbarium specimens have been used to introduce wild-collected material to the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RBGE) living plant collection. The ability of dry habitat ferns to maintain spore viability for prolonged periods makes it possible to grow plants from the historically important RBGE herbarium collections. The factors that affect the ability of spores to germinate from herbarium collections are described. Three fern species from the Pteridaceae – Actiniopteris semiflabellata, Anogramma leptophylla and Aleuritopteris scioana – which were not previously in cultivation at RBGE were germinated from herbarium material of different ages. Germination was observed from all three species. Plants produced in this experiment were accessed into the RBGE living plant collection for future horticultural research and germination trials.