"Little Dumpies" found (at last) on Mt Gibraltar

I have been told for several years that the oddly-named "Little Dumpies" Orchids grow on The Gib. The name is not very flattering, but the flower itself is quite handsome, in a Greenhoodish kind of way. It is a relatively large flower, a little heavy in the front end of the "hood", but on a short stem. That is the reason for both the common name, and its scientific name Diplodium (or Pterostylis) truncata.

Here is the Botanical illustration from PlantNET, (from the linked site above).

Here is one growing amongst native grasses, in a fairly open position.

I have searched "The Gib" for these plants for two years, but my friends Colin and Mischa, came up from Victoria this week, and they had seen them here previously, and knew what to look for, and more importantly where and when to look for them. As with all Greenhoods, these plants go dormant, and become impossible to find. They are hard enough to find, even when in flower, because they tend to grow amongst grasses and other small plants in little rock crevices.

Note the heavy front end of the "hood" and the very fine "points" or "ears".

Colin's camera lens adds a sense of scale.

Fron the front end, you can see the blunt hood.
This specimen had nice "points" either side of the hood.

After Colin and Mischa's success in finding this Greenhood, I showed them some other leaves of other Orchids which I had been monitoring for some time, but without ever finding flowers on them. We scoured the patch of dense grass where the leaves were, and Colin found a flower. It turns out to be a large "Wasp Orchid" - Chiloglottis trilabra.

Botanical illustration courtesy of PlantNET (from the linked site above).Note the "glands" on the labellum going almost to the fine end of the Labellum
Also note the Labellum has a central "tip" which is clearly illustrated above.
Sorry the photo is so dark. I shall take a better image soon and replace these.
(Click to enlarge the images)
From the side, you can see the Lateral Sepals hang more or less straight down.
They are neither "reflexed" (as is Ch. reflexa)
nor bent forward underneath the flower, as is Ch. diphylla

I say large, compared to most of the other species of "Wasp Orchids" I have seen in the Southern Highlands, but of course, it is small compared to the Simpliglottis chlorantha, one of a related group of plants, which have now been split off from the Chiloglottis, (for very good reasons, I believe). Those larger flowered plants are better known as "bird orchids".