how easy is it to differentiate between scale and spores as they look similar to the scale i used to get on my tricolour plant.

the dryopteris are covered in them (on the back of the fronds), the cyrtomium fortunei has some leaves covered and some with a couple scattered here and there. the athyriums seem to have oblong shaped ones (especially on the okanum), but they are very regimented in a positional sense, so hope they are spores. can anyone confirm?

i'd quite like to try and germinate some if they are, any tips? thanks

Here's one from OZ, for growing Ferns from spores:
http://www.home.aone.net.au/~byzantium/ferns/growing.html
Sorry, you will have to cut and paste this into your browser window. GW would not accept an intext link.
Good luck!
Rb