Journal Number 95
May 2005

ORIGINAL PAPERS

Comings and Goings
By Leicester Kyle - Buller

Over the seven years for which I've owned this property I've been impressed by the movement of orchids, by their attempts to lodge themselves, their failures and successes.

The half-hectare offers a range of environments: it's at 300 metres above sea level, and is bisected by a small gorge cut through the sandstone. Both sides of the creek were once inhabited, but in the 1960s when the coal mines closed, all but two of the houses were taken away; the two remaining are occupied. Bush now covers the vacated sites-rata and kamahi mostly, with some manuka and toro, and emerging podocarps. There is an abundance of tree ferns, while flax and coprosma occupy the less hospitable places. The annual rainfall of three metres means there's always a lot of water around and a great variety of mosses liverworts and filmy ferns, especially in the gorge.

There's a wide range of habitats, and it must have been much wider for a time after the houses were taken away; a good deal of what I now see must be the aftermath of that event, when so many species were presented with vacant lots, piles of bricks, paths, concrete yards, unwanted roads, and old fire bases to claim.

After forty years, however that colonising vegetation is starting to age; some sites are darkening and others are gaining light-this is particularly affecting the Pterostylis: once sizeable colonies of P. irsoniana and montana are now reduced to a few weak seedlings, while new colonies are forming where none grew before.

All the time new sites are being tried out. Adenochilus gracilis appeared in a hollow between two pungas; it lasted for three years, never flowering, but then vanished, perhaps overwhelmed by frond-fall. I personally introduced a plant if Chiloglottis cornuta-it flowered, seeded, and has since appeared abundantly in many parts of the property; this year there are many seedlings but no flowers. Aporostylis bifolia has seeded down-slope from its arrival site, into leaf-mould, and is flowering but rank, clearly not quite content.

Caladenia atradenia & nothofageti are widespread and very abundant under scrub, but the great success is Corybas papa; this appeared by a foot-track about four years ago, at an old chimney base, as a very new plant, and has spread rapidly, intensifyng its growth. It flowers freely in the late winter, but has produced no seed. It shouldn't be here, and its manner of arrival is a mystery, but it might have originated from some papa country about ten kilometres to the north.

Thelymitras are constantly appearing on punga trunks, with pot-plants, by tracks, but they are opportunists and none have stayed. Microtis unifolia is more enduring, even in the bush.

The epiphytes can also be transient. Earina mucronata has tried several old willows, but not lasted; it prospers on a macrocarpa trunk and on a punga, as does E. autumnalis. About three years ago Bulbophyllum pygmaeum appeared as a seedling on a toro trunk, was soon joined by another, and now both are one and spreading. Similarly, a Winika seedling has lodged on a rock in my rockery.

A Gastrodia showed at the foot of my garden, against a macrocarpa tree, as a young plant with five buds. Being on the lawn, it was accidentally mown, then showed again. After being cut a second time it gave up and hasn't reappeared; I've found no others on the property.

Every year there are pleasant surprises, and the odd disappointment. Some seed is brought by water, others by wind, bird or gravity; also, the removal of gorse, blackberry, willow, and other weeds creates new sites. About fifty orchid species grow on the adjacent hills, so there are more to be welcomed yet.