Pterostylis tanypoda
(the elongated pedicel in mature plants)

Distribution - endemic - eastern South Id.
Locally common in grass.

Flowers - October-January - self pollinated

Pterostylis tristis
(drab coloured)

This is a more slender plant than tanypoda, usually brownish or reddish, and the labellar appendage points downward.

Distribution - endemic - North Id. Hawkes Bay and the Central Plateau: South Id. - Canterbury to Otago.

Flowers - October-January - self pollinated

Pterostylis foliata
(leafy)

Leaves in a semi-rosette, flower slender,
short-sepalled, erect.

Distribution - Australia - South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales, Tasmania.
New Zealand - North and South Is.
From Mount Pirongia to Dunedin - usually in grass or open areas in forest.

Flowers - October-December - self pollinated

Pterostylis nutans
(nodding - the bent-over flower)

A very distinct species, with large leaves in a basal rosette, and the ovary bent over so the flower faces downward.

Distribution - Australia - South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, Tasmania.
New Zealand - 3 records to date - Kaitaia 1910:
Castor Bay (Auckland North Shore) 1942:
Waihaha (west of Taupo) 1995.

Flowers - August-October - insect pollinated

Pterostylis puberula
(the hairs on the flower stem)

A small plant, it has a basal rosette of trowel-shaped leaves with narrowly winged petioles, and hairs on the flower stem.

The dorsal sepal is very short and ± obtuse.
The lateral sepals have a high, rather shallow sinus with a small inflexed lobe, and long erect caudae sometimes thickened at the tips.

Distribution - endemic - Three Kings Is. and near Thames in the Coromandel Ranges.

At one time common on the Auckland gum clay, and around Wellington and in the Sounds / Nelson district, only the 2 colonies are now known.

I last saw it growing at Silverdale, north of Auckland
in 1947.

Flowers - September - self pollinated

Pterostylis tasmanica
(from Tasmania)

A very distinct plant. Leaves in a semi-rosette
and scattered up the stem.

Lateral sepals deflexed. The filiform labellum is covered with long yellow hairs and has a dark
brown callus at the tip.

Distribution - Australia - Tasmania, Victoria.
New Zealand - Three Kings Is. North Id. from the North Cape to the Waikato, and about Wellington: South Id. Sounds / Nelson district.

Flowers - October - self pollinated