In addition to the exploration of the main range I have paid a good deal of attention to orchids;
and as these plants have on the whole very short seasons, it might not be unprofitable to put
in a connected form the months in which they bloom in the Thames District.

This is the more easy, as the different species appear from month to month throughout the year with such regularity as to form a kind of floral calendar by their successive appearance in flower.

The botanical year may be said to commence in June, when Acianthus sinclairii comes into flower.
It first appears on the hill-sides in the bush near tufts of Astelia, where there is rich mould. A week later Pterostylis trullifolia is in full flower in rocky places on patches of moss. This is a common plant in damp places of the sides of fern hills.

During the last week in June Corysanthes rivularis begins to appear in damp places near the foot of forest hills, and later, along the banks of mountain streams. All these orchids continue through the month of July.

In August Corysanthes macrantha, C. oblonga and C. triloba can be found in flower. They affect high ground on the borders of heavy bush-land and grow best in rich black mould. Their purple flowers are warnings that the rarest orchids are about to appear and may disappear also in the same month of September. The rare orchids are Cyrtostylis oblonga, Pterostylis puberula and Pterostylis squamata. They all grow on low hills covered with fern (Pteris aquilina) and tea-tree (Leptospermum scoparium), but are not equally abundant.

There are at least fifty plants of the two first-mentioned to one of Pterostylis squamata. This plant grows amongst tea-tree (Leptospermum scoparium) and always near the summit of low hills.

Very few of the flowers come to maturity, as they are destroyed by minute insects before the flowers open. Another enemy to it is fire, as the vegetation is annually burnt off the hills where it grows. This year I could find it only in those places that escaped the fire last year; and as its extinction is not improbable, I enclose a painting of it in full bloom.

Whilst these are in bloom on the bare hills, Pterostylis graminea is in flower on the ridges of steep bush-land hills.

In the beginning of October Pterostylis banksii begins to flower in the woods whilst Thelymitra imberbis and Caladenia minor have taken the place of Pterostylis puberula and Cyrtostylis oblonga on the low hills.

Towards the end of the month Thelymitra longifolia is also in flower, and Chiloglottis cornuta is found on steep ridges where no bush fires have been.

The commonest orchids appear in November. They are Microtis porrifolia and Orthoceras
solandri. These plants along with Thelymitra longifolia, are so abundant on some hillsides near
native settlements that pigs turn over the soil in large patches for the sake of getting at the tubers.
Sarcochilus adversus that blooms in the same month and grows on the boles of trees is not by
any means common.

These plants with Bulbophyllum pygmaeum flourish through the month of December.

The orchids of January are Gastrodia cunninghamii and Thelymitra pulchella. The former though
a large plant is extremely difficult to see, and the latter I only found once, and that was near the summit of Pakirarahi.

Earina autumnalis begins to flower in February, and can be found in flower for a couple on months.

The last orchid of the year that I found was Prasophyllum pumilum. It flowers in the middle of March, and is not only rare but also easily overlooked in the low tea-tree where it grows.

My collection of orchids at the Thames numbers twenty-seven, and the whole number peculiar to New Zealand is forty. I do not include in this number Adenochilus gracilis, for although it appears in Mr. Kirk's list I have not been able to find it here.