Wild Orchids dug up in the bush near Mittagong

ILLEGAL ORCHID POACHING HAS OCCURRED IN MITTAGONG.

I am so angry about this.

Last year I found a colony of very fine Bunochilus tunstallii near Mittagong (a bit out of their normal range).

I foolishly reported this event on THIS blog.

Several months later, I was back in the same area, and realised somebody had dug a hole where these plants had been (or so I believed). I could not be sure, at the time (when I first saw the hole), as these Orchids go dormant after flowering, so I could not be absolutely sure that the plants had been stolen - but in my heart of hearts I knew that was almost certainly the case.

So, this year,
I went back to look for the same Orchids,
in the same place.

Nothing.

Not a leaf, not a flower.

Bloody nothing!
Just dead leaves blown into the hole.

Hole marks where Orchids were stolen.

To prove that it was not my imagination, and that my timing was not wrong, I searched further around and found a few (just a few) Bunochilus tunstallii in flower. These were not the same plants as I found last year, as they were much more "overgrown" than last years plants (last year's plants were growing quite "out in the open").

Bunochilus tunstallii today,
at Mount Alexandra Reserve

But the point is, I now have evidence that someone has removed the main colony of Bunochilus tunstallii which flowered on Mount Alexandra, last year.

Photographic evidence clearly shows the excavation.

The top edge of the excavation has left a wall of soil approximately 100mm deep (about 4 inches).

The excavation is approximately 600 mm long (north to south), and 300 mm wide (east to west).

There is no doubt in my mind that this is the handiwork (spadework) of an Orchid "enthusiast" - someone who had marked out the location of these plants and has come back when the plants were dormant, to dig and remove the tubers. In fact he (or they) dug the entire colony of these plants and removed soil and all. 

What annoys me so much is that this is so obviously the work of a "collector". Only an Orchid specialist would even know there was something special about these plants.

So, while supposedly an "Orchid Lover", this person has put his lust to "possess" these plants over and above the well-being of the species. That is not the act of an orchid lover, but the act of a selfish individual - one who has lost perspective of what is important about these plants.

This species of Orchid is uncommon (it is very limited in its distribution). But it is not yet "listed" as a rare or threatened species, as the bureaucratic process involved in getting a plant "listed" is very slow, and hopelessly "behind" what ought be the real list of threatened species.

However, all Orchid enthusiasts know "All native plants including orchids are protected and it is illegal to remove them from the wild."

This statement (or a similar warning) appears on most ANOS websites. 

"All native orchids in Australia are protected in the wild;

- their collection is illegal."

This illegal action occurred within the Mt Alexandra Reserve.

I shall report this to the Wingecarribee Shire Council, which "administers" this area.

Bunochilus tunstallii
note the dark brown labellum
(click on the image to enlarge it to see the detail)

As Bunochilus tunstallii is not readily available for sale, if someone suddenly turns up to show this species on the Show Bench, I for one will be wanting to ask about the provenance of those plants. And I will do my best to spread the word amongst Orchid Societies in Australia. and overseas.