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Journal Number 92
September 2004
THE COLUMN
Hunting Thelymitra colensoi -
Finding Thelymitra aff pauciflora variants and T. "Ahipara"
By Eric Scanlen
Thelymitra "bee" was the only taxon available for the specimen hunters on 23 Oct 03 after the DoC permit-to-collect a range of unnamed taxa from Te Paki for Dr Brian Molloy, had bogged down in red tape. The moral learned was to apply for the permit at least six weeks ahead of time and say goodbye to your $250, non-refundable fee. The Column didn't improve the shining hour by then referring to the permit as a deterrent, in emails to DoC officials. Brian had persuaded Landcare to supply the fee so that hunt has now been put forward to Oct 04.
Meanwhile, Elizabeth Mackenzie was happy for us to collect three stems of T. "bee" [J74:13 & colour page 1] for classification purposes if it showed up in quantity this year at her Hatfields Beach property. Well it didn't, as it hasn't in the previous two years, much to the disappointment of Brian Tyler, Allan Ducker, and the Column.
However, not 20m from the T. "bee" site, on 23 Oct 03, Brian T saw a solitary and tiny T. aff. pauciflora (?) about two thirds the normal size in both stem and flower, sky blue with yellowish tepal tips, sporting no black saddle on an all white column (Fig. 1) but with the requisite split yellow, postanther lobe and flowering three weeks ahead of regular T. aff. pauciflora.
For a while, the Column searched out details of T. colensoi Hook.f. but it lacked the necessary long anther and despite being small, it was twice too big! |
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Allan had seen slender, few flowered plants (but never open) on road edges from Mangamuka to the NW fringes of the Waitakeres. He showed the Column videos of a column or three rotating slowly on his vidcam turntable. The flowers were pauci blue and had rose pink columns with coral pink saddles. Allan's
T. "coral column" has to be a different taxon and it has a greater claim to being T. colensoi than Brian T's find because it is widespread and has a long anther; unlike regular T. aff. pauciflora.
Forestry Research, Whakarewarewa, 29 Nov 03. Allan and the Column, on a visit with Chris Ecroyd to his Paracaleana minor colony, spotted a cluster of T. aff. pauciflora (?) in a bark-garden, slender, pink stemmed with closed, orchid pink tepals. Inside each bud, a rose pink column with the mandatory split yellow p.a. lobe and a red saddle but only an inconspicuous anther so it varied a little from Allan's Mangamuka to Waitakere taxon. Those, rarely opening, mini T. aff. pauciflora meet many of the criteria for T. colensoi (except Hooker's "yellowish" and tiny 8.5mm breadth) but the jury is still out. More info please.
After the 23 Oct 03, E. Mackenzie country ramble, complete with open
T. aff. ixioides and a few
T. intermedia, the trio checked Wilks Road, Silverdale where Allan knew of good habitat. Long abandoned road works had become a reedy bog.
Hordes of T. carnea with some flowers flat open in the heat
(Fig. 2) with recent rain-water on their columns; yet they are notorious for staying shut in order to protect the pollinia and stigma from the wet?
Stegostyla atradenia was also open nearby but no coral columned Thelymitra were among many robust T. aff. pauciflora here in bud. |
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So, on a hot 19 Nov when the regular T. aff. pauciflora (yellow tops, Fig. 3) were opening in droves at 11 am, Allan pointed out a few of his similar taxon, opening with a more purplish flower and a bright orange p.a. lobe (orange tops, Fig. 4).
They were interspersed with yellow tops in two areas with no apparent hybrids. One healthy orange top with 32 florets was about 500mm tall. This is not R. Brown's "few flowered" T. pauciflora, is it? The flowers and description closely match Backhouse & Jeanes' T. sp. aff. pauciflora 2, on David McConachie's CD.
The best yellow tops were smaller with up to 12 florets per stem, sometimes with three open at once. Only an occasional flower opened on the robust orange tops whilst one plant, only 300 tall, sported four open flowers at 12 noon. Brian Tyler reported from Grays Rd near Levin, 21 robust orange tops each with five to eight flowers, and most of them open it would seem from the picture.
Allan also spotted a robust but solitary and multiflowered, baby pink Thelymitra with three of the top four florets open; all three had different columns (?).They all had white cilia on the column arms ruling out ubiquitous T. carnea now in seed. The top column had a curiously folded p.a. lobe which the other two lacked. There are photos and video records. Mutated T. aff. pauciflora maybe'? |
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Historic note. Hooker first put T. pauciflora on the NZ map, then realising his error, replaced it with T. colensoi but what he had, wasn't T. pauciflora R. Br. that Cheeseman later reintroduced, also in error but for a different taxon. Cheeseman's plant, now T. aff. pauciflora, had a split yellow postanther lobe, not Robert Brown's emarginate (shallowly notched) one. Argument still rages over Brown's 1810, three line, coded Latin diagnosis for T. pauciflora but we can leave the Aussie's to that one; it's their orchid and it is due for redefining into self and insect pollinated taxa for starters.
All that aside, Allan's find of the year was five Thelymitra in a soggier place, with flowers closed like oysters despite the heat and the columns looked like those of T. "darkie", even if the blue tepals were too pale, the purplish stems were also too pale and the three bracts were not a bright enough green for T. "darkie".
T. "Ahipara", weren't they? never reported, to the Column's knowledge, outside of the far north. Tipping over a seedling tea-tree to let the sun beat on the cluster of five had no opening effect on this taxon. The only open flowers ever reported were in a car boot, during Peter de Lange's "great translocation" [J67:24] from Ahipara to Lake Ohia etc.
Conclusion
1. There are widespread, slender Thelymitra from Mangamuka to Whakarewarewa, which could be
T. colensoi. The most likely taxon, with purplish blue to orchid pink tepals, opens rarely, has a pink column with a reddish saddle and sometimes has the long anther described by Hooker. It favours road edges and is easily mistaken for a stunted T. aff. pauciflora; hence no specimens have been sent to Brian Molloy for DNA profiling!
2. The solitary pale blue, early opening, slender form from Hatfields Beach could be a contender for
T. colensoi if more ever show up.
3. The orange top, robust, T. aff. pauciflora from Silverdale and Levin displays different traits
from the regular yellow topped form and could be Backhouse and Jeanes' T. sp. aff. pauciflora 2.
DNA profiling will tell.
4. T. "Ahipara" has shown up at Wilks Rd., ER9.
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