Owen Gibson, the son of carpenter Cedric (Sid) Gibson and his wife Gertrude May Gibson, nee Parkin, was born in New Plymouth and grew up in the suburb of Westown.

At the age of 15 or 16 he left New Plymouth Boys' High School, where his father had earlier been Dux, and took employment as a trainee with nurserymen Duncan and Davies, working up to the position of block manager. Founded at Westown in 1899, Duncan and Davies was to become the largest grower of ornamental trees and shrubs in the Southern Hemisphere.

Owen imbibed a love of the outdoors and its wildlife from his father, and as a lad accompanied him to nearby Barrett Lagoon, or further afield to Mt Taranaki and the ranges, sometimes with friend and orchid enthusiast Bruce Irwin.

Later Owen Gibson replaced his father on native orchid expeditions with Irwin, and in 1947 discovered a new species of Pterostylis on the mountain. He drew it, and in 1950 ED Hatch described Pterostylis irsoniana, "Ir-son", a combination of the names of the two men "who between them have done much to elucidate the orchid flora of Mt Egmont". The investigations of Irwin and Gibson led to Hatch's paper Orchids of the Egmont Ranges, published in 1953.

On an expedition to Northland in 1949 they found an unusual Thelymitra that Irwin nicknamed "sanscilia". On their return south, near Wellsford, Gibson found Corybas cryptanthus (now Molloybas cryptanthus), a little-known, almost subterranean spider orchid.

Their last trip together was to Arthur's Pass in January 1957, looking for orchids, of course!

Owen Gibson married Phyllis Swan; they were to have two sons and a daughter. In 1962 the family moved to Waitara, leased a block of land, and started their nursery Seaview Plants. Gibson was a good plantsman, and did considerable work with hybrids. In the 1970s he grew the award-winning native flax "Yellow Wave" for horiculturalist and plant breeder Felix Jury, and recognised the qualities of a Leucadendron hybrid bred by Mr Bell, Wanganui, raising and introducing "Safari Sunset" to New Zealand gardeners and cut flower growers.

Owen and Phyllis Gibson both enjoyed drawing, painting and, in the early days, going on art group excursions. Owen had studied watercolour painting at night school, and his native orchid watercolours were accurate as well as artistic. He was a keen sportsman, and when at Duncan and Davies, played cricket for Westown. Taking after his father, he was also a competent handyman, and built a bach at Onaero, in North Taranaki.

Unfortunately, ongoing health problems led to Owen Gibson's untimely death at Waitara in 1978,
at the age of 49.

His colleague Bruce Irwin will be the subject of a future article in this series.
 

Pterostylis irsoniana  Hatch. Trans. & Proc. Roy. Soc. New Zealand 78: 104 t.18 (1950).

Pterostylis irsoniana (named for Bruce Irwin and Owen Gibson who first found it) is a strongly coloured plant up to 35 cm high, but often much smaller, with the uppermost leaf usually overtopping the flower.

It is distinguished from the other species in the genus by its characteristic labellum, which is very narrow, arched and protrudes from the flower, its dark, n-shaped tip curling back to form a U-shaped scoop (see Eric Scanlen's photograph below).

The labellum is unique in having a large dark prominent callus at the base, and sometimes smaller calli along the midline.

Flowering December-February, Pterostylis irsoniana grows in subalpine scrub and forest margins from Mt Egmont/Taranaki and East Cape southwards (but not Mt Ruapehu) and in the South Island, Nelson and Westland.