A few years ago now Pat Enright and Olaf John discovered a tiny colony of the undescribed Nematoceras "rest area" (so named by its discoverer Bruce Irwin because he found it by a stream alongside a highway rest area south of Taupo).

Pat and Olaf s discovery was important, because it was near Wellington (Puffer track, Kaitoke), so the wide separation gave credence to Bruce's claim that it is distinct.

I saw it there again on 9 October 2005, a 25cm diameter colony under fern beside a trackside trickle, several flowers spent, but one in full glory - see cover photograph.

I think "Nematoceras restarea" would be a good name for it - celebrating its first discovery by a stream near a highway rest area on the Central Volcanic Plateau, celebrating Bruce Irwin's puckish sense of humour in tagging it thus, and celebrating its survival after burial in volcanic ash from the big Ruapehu eruption of a few years ago.

(Latin restare = to be left behind, to survive; restarea = survivor?).

Nice pun I think.

Jan Kelly wrote (26 October), "Hymenochilus tanypodus.

My husband Errol Kelly found these orchids in the Tekapo basin Sunday 23rd (Labour weekend); they seem to be early?

There were 50 or so, singly and in big groups, just poking out of the Hieracium but clearly well into their flowering season.

This is the first time we have seen this wee orchid. It was on the road to Round Hill Ski Area. We looked downhill of the site, nearer the lake, and found none, so it may only be on the terraces.

Not knowing who to tell about it I phoned Mt Gerald Station and told Mr. Burtscher, he was absolutely delighted. The owner of Richmond Station is away at the moment. I thought that if they knew the orchids were there they would take care of that small environment, which it seems they will."  

Ian Reid sent photographs he had taken in the late 1980's of a Prasophyllum:

Recent journals and even earlier, back to No 75, highlighted Prasophyllum aff. patens, and alerted me to old photo records made in the 1980's to 1990 in north Waikato - from (a named) swamp.

In the late 1980's Peter de Lange introduced me to the dome of this swamp, where many rare orchids - Thelymitra sp. and Pterostylis - flower in November / December.

I showed photos at an earlier Iwitahi meet, of a Prasophyllum I chanced to pull up from a watery bog; that is, I raised the long green flowering stem - like a piece of hose wallowing in the wet - covered with flowers. No-one with me saw the plant as I photographed it - we were scouting separately on the dome.

After seeing my photos, I realised further study was calling, but on subsequent trips to the dome I never found the plant again.

Helen Richards wrote, "Thelymitra Kay Nesbitt is a hybrid which Les Nesbitt made, then registered in 1992, naming it after his wife Kay, who died shortly afterwards from cancer. She didn't quite make 50. Kay was a friend of mine and that is the reason I grow it, and I was given the tubers by Les.

I am a species person, so it is the only man-made hybrid I have in my (extensive) Australian native collection. T. Kay Nesbitt is T. antennifera X rubra. Les gave me several tubers, and their colours vary. I have separated out the 'rusty-red' ones (in the Bulletin) and there is also a 'lolly-pink' colour. There was one honey-coloured flower last year which I separated out, but unfortunately it didn't come up this year.

Les told me that he had noticed that some of them multiply and some don't, so I am checking that out also at repotting time. Certainly most seem to, which is what you would expect from the parentage. They do make a lovely show every year, and as they multiply, I am sharing them around."

The stunning photograph below is by Monty Wild, and first appeared in the Australasian Native Orchid Society (Victorian Group)'s Bulletin, November 2005; the plant won "Best Cultivated Terrestrial Orchid" at the Group's Spring Show.

The Waikaremoana field trip turned out to be something of a disaster, with torrential rain turning to horizontal sleet as the southerlies hammered the unhappy participants.

Of some consolation were excellent slide presentations in the DOC centre from Brian Tyler and Graeme Jane.

We added two orchids to the local list - Nematoceras "Trotters"
and Pterostylis aff. montana.

I was interested in the local version of Thelymitra nervosa, which has the expected spotted petals and white cilia, but lacks the tuberculate back to the post-anther lobe, and has the upright leaf and deeply cleft post-anther lobe of T. hatchii.

Margaret Menzies photographed a double-flowered Nematoceras iridescens at Waitiri track.

I've seen plenty of double Singularybas, but never
a double Nematoceras before this: does anyone
else have photographs [note J81 p41 Eric Scanlen's
N. acuminata]?

Mark Moorhouse sent excerpts from "On the Flowering Plants of Stewart Island" by T. Kirk, F.L.S. [T.N.Z.I. Vol XVII, 1884, Article XXIV. Pp. 217, 224. Read to Southland Institute 9 Dec 1884]:

Amongst the shrubs the soil is often carpeted with a compact growth of the charming liliaceous plant, Callixene parviflora, with its elegant drooping flowers, mixed with numerous ferns, orchids, and mosses.

The orchids form a marked feature in some parts of the forest. Corysanthes oblonga, C. rivularis, and others produce their attractive flowers literally by the thousands; in no other locality have I seen these interesting plants in such vast profusion. Gastrodia cunninghamii is rare, having been observed only on the small island of Ulva. Caladenia bifolia is frequent, one of its forms making a close approach to C. lyallii.

Chiloglottis cornuta occurs on Ulva, the glands on the labellum vary considerably in their shape and arrangement. In the majority of cases there are five depressed coloured glands arranged in a symmetrical manner, in a few specimens they were reduced to three, and in a solitary plant numerous stalked glands were arranged in a double row down the middle of the labellum exactly as in the Tasmanian C. gunnii, which is probably a state of the New Zealand plant.

The dwarf variety of Pterostylis banksii, with abbreviated sepals, is common in open places in the forest.

In addition to the terrestrial forms, the epiphytic forms are well represented, with the exception of Sarcochilus, which appears to be rare, and Bulbophyllum, which has not been observed on the island.... Two specimens of a small epiphytic orchid were obtained on the descent from Mt Anglem. It seems probable that they will form the type of a new genus closely allied to Burnettia and Chiloglottis.

Mark commented, "The unnamed species of orchid found on the side of Mt Anglem, on Stewart Island, sounds like a non-flowering specimen of Pterostylis venosa or humilis. I have pictures of just such two-leaved plants from up behind the Mt Rochfort TV translator above Westport." And was this the first report of Chiloglottis valida in New Zealand?

And what about those dwarf Pterostylis banksii? - Ed.

Brian Tyler wrote, "To add minor but maybe significant observations to Bruce's article on winter chilling in Journal 97: the Nematoceras longipetala from around the Levin area were in full flower early July this year, while plants from the same roadside locations now growing in the glasshouse started flowering at least two weeks later, even into August for some. Frosts were a feature of early winter this year followed by relatively mild weather until September.

During Labour weekend we found Pterostylis banksii flowering beside the Ohinetonga loop track on the bank of the Whakapapa river at Owhango. Yesterday ( 9 November) a walk up Grays Road had large numbers of plants but no flowers, some in bud but mostly not that far advanced. I guess the winter would have been colder in the Central High Country than around here.

Conversely I had a Thelymitra longifolia flower in the glasshouse on 27/28 October whereas those in the open have not yet flowered. Perhaps they prefer a warmer winter and don't need any chilling. The glasshouse air temperature falls to about 5 deg C on a typical frosty morning, so the ground temperature is probably several degrees warmer than roadside banks in the mountains."

"Should we ask the group to report first flowering dates of some selected species from around the country?"

Ontogeny follows phylogeny is a dictum I learned at medical school.

Ontogeny is the individual development of an organism throughout its life (life lasts, I am told by bawdy friends, not from the cradle to the grave, but from the sperm to the worm - the conception to the resurrection).

Phylogeny is the evolutionary development of a species or higher taxonomic group of organisms.

We humans start life individually as a single amoeba-like cell and develop through stages that look in turn like a fish, a reptile, a monkey and finally a human. And we humans, as a species, developed evolutionarily in a similar fashion. Ontogeny follows phylogeny: it's a simplistic notion, but it can be a useful one.

I haven't seen the dictum applied to plants, but why shouldn't it be?

An evolutionarily advanced Nematoceras like N. longipetala emerges from the ground, its bud cupped in the concave leaf, its tepals curled above and around the bud. The tepals straighten as the bud grows upward; the labellum openings form and the edges flare; the tepals elongate and become more delicate. If you stop this process at midpoint, you get a short, upright flower, its labellum not fully open, its tepals upright and stout.

And it looks a little like N dienema, from which, indeed, it may have evolved - or the other way around.

Among my father's papers I recently found "Te Aroha And The Fortunate Valley - Pioneering In The Thames Valley 1867 - 1930" , a little book produced to mark the 50th anniversary of Te Aroha in 1930. One of the chapters is "Some botanical notes" by Marguerite Crookes. In it she wrote,

"Of the Orchids of the Te Aroha district, I could write much.

The native Dendrobium (Dendrobium cunninghamii) with its white or pink flowers (December to February), and its stems jointed like miniature bamboos is common perching on trees.

The Earina's both perch, one (E. mucronata flowering in spring, and the other (E. autumnalis) jutting forth its deliciously scented sprays in autumn. Species of the lovely Thelymitra are found on the flat while the fascinating Orthoceras strictum, whose flowers look for all the world like beetles climbing up a stick, flourishes on the forest outskirts.

There are four species of that quaint little plant Corysanthes, which looks so much like a red spider sitting on a leaf. These are particularly common in the Waiorongomai Gorge.

We must not forget the species of Pterostylis with its big, green, hooded flowers, or the Maori onion (Microtis longifolia) which flourishes in the open.

The little winter flowering orchid (Acianthus sinclairii), with its spike of little green, pointed flowers rising from the centre of a heart-shaped leaf, and the tiny fragile, pink Cyrtostylis oblonga, will be seen when there is little else flowering.

Two species of the parasitic orchid (Gastrodia) are found in the Ohinemuri County."  

Field trip to the Far North

Labour weekend plus a day. Trips are planned to the Scientific Reserve at the Surville Cliffs for
Thelymitra sanscilia and T. "darkie" amongst others. Scott point for Petalochilus saccatus and
Caladenia aff. bartlettii maybe Thelymitra aff. longifolia forms galore and many other species
for sure.

The DoC Shearers Quarters have been booked for the first 12 applicants with a $30 deposit for an all up accommodation cost of $50 for the three nights, overflow to the Waitiki Landing cabins or backpackers. Provisions for the Shearers Quarters will be supplied at cost because there is only one fridge.

Those at Waitiki Landing with store, bar and restaurant will be left to their own devices for food and accommodation. Travel will be by car pooling; 4WDs are needed for a fine weather trip to the Scientific Reserve.

Those interested in sampling the orchid splendour of Te Paki please register with Eric Scanlen at 09 2984868 so that further details can be sent to you and half-way accommodation can be arranged if necessary. Please supply details of your vehicle so that car pooling can be organised.