"Little Dumpies" - Diplodium truncatum - Greenhoods burst into flower

Kirsten sent me a message today, that she had found a colony of "Little Dumpies" - Diplodium truncatum.



It was a quiet day in Robbo, so once the clock passed 3:00PM when the RMS (formerly the RTA) people opened up Macquarie Pass, I drove down the Pass, to check them out.

I have seen Little Dumpies previously, a few on Mt Gibraltar, several years ago, and a good group at Bungonia Gorge, last year. But they are not "common" around here, well, not in my experience.

This is the best, (densest) colony of these Greenhoods

which I have ever seen.

A dense colony of "Little Dumpies" Diplodium truncatum

These plants have a very abrupt point to the "galea" (the hood) which is shown well in this illustration from PlantNET.

Botanical illustration from PlantNET
"Little Dumpies" Diplodium truncatum

These plants were growing amongst dense plants of Kangaroo Grass, at Croom Reserve, Albion Park, NSW. The grass was very dense, and these plants seemed as if they ought have been quite overgrown, but clearly they were not troubled by the grass.

"Little Dumpies" Diplodium truncatum

These Diplodium plants form rosettes on non-flowering plants.

The flowering plants have their flowers emerge directly from the ground

without any rosette leaves.

Many non-flowering rosettes of "Little Dumpies" Diplodium truncatum

"Little Dumpies" Diplodium truncatum

Because these Greenhoods were growing amongst dense Kangaroo Grass, they were difficult to count, but I estimate that there were about 150 flowers growing in a patch 1.5 metres long by 1 metre wide. There were 3, main clusters of these Greenhoods, growing in clearings between the clumps of the Kangaroo Grass.

An interesting note is that these plants are flowering much earlier than I have previously seen them flower (admittedly in the Southern Highlands), on 3 May 2011 (at Bungonia) and 8 May 2009 (on Mt Gibraltar).

There is some colour variation between these flowers and those at Bungonia, which are much more reddish.

Spring Is coming in a rush, in the "bush".

This post will primarily be about Orchids, but let me just say that the "bush" is coming alive in the Illawarra and Southern Highlands. And it looks great!

Wattles are in flower everywhere, lining the roads and tracks, and the Pea flowers are climbing, scrambling or in the case of the shrubby ones, just standing up and flowering their little heads off.

But amongst these shrubs, the spring-flowering Orchids are just coming into flower too.

Just down my local hill, below Macquarie Pass, at Albion Park, the rare and endangered Illawarra Greenhood - better known simply as "gibbosas", have started to flower. 

The name Oligochaetochilus gibbosus amounts to the unpronounceable in search of the "bent over". 

Gibbous means humpbacked. The other part of the name, refers to its few spiky hairs on the labellum.

It is listed under the EPBC Act as Endangered, because of its limited distribution.

Here is the flower seen from the side
It is demonstrating its "gibbous" posture.

Oligochaetochilus gibbosus

And from the front, with the labellum "set"

Oligochaetochilus gibbosus

The EPBC Act recovery plan for this species includes this Pterostylis gibbosa drawing by A. W. Dockrill (reproduced from The Orchardian Volume 12, Number 3, March 1997 with the permission of the Editor)

">Botanical drawing of this species by AW Dockrill

In the same area, is found a cousin of that first species, Hymenochilus bicolor

It is a Midget Greenhood which has been renamed. In common parlance it is called the Black-tip Greenhood, in reference to its labellum. 

Black-tip Greenhood Hymenochilus bicolor

***************

In the same area I found the first of the regular spring "Caladenias"

This is Petalochilus carneus, best known as "Pink Fingers"

Petalochilus carneus

 There is often considerable variation between different flowers.

Pink Fingers Orchid  Petalochilus carneus

There will be many more of these "Spring Orchids" over the next few days. 

Time and space are running out on me.