ORCHIDACEAE

Sagg Spider Orchid

Endangered 

 

Flowers 1-2 white to cream with very pale reddish lines and dark grey to blackish petal and sepal tips, labellum white to cream, sometimes the mid-lobe maroon, calli reddish purple, column transluscent with reddish markings. 

 

Leaf narrowly lanceolate, base purple blotched, densely hairy. Scape wiry, densely hairy. 

Clarence 

Dry Eucalypt Forest and Woodland; Grassy Vegetation 

Tas. endemic. Grows abundantly between and in sagg tussocks (namesake). Sparse woodland with old Eucalyptus viminalis. treesand scattered shrubs. 

Dry; Exposed; Exposed; Moist 

Moderate 

Loam; Sandy; Well-drained 

This type of woodland has been greatly reduced since european settlement. Most abundant where ground is regularly disturbed by horses and appears to overlap the area of greatest rabbit activity, while few or no plants are found elsewhere in the same habitat. Suitable below powerlines. 

 

Standard 

 

 

Orchid seeds are very minute yellow, brown or blackish dust-like particles. Orchid seeds are produced within a capsule that splits at maturity and releases tousands to millions of seeds. Dispersed by wind and water and only germinate following infection of the embryo by a suitable mycorrhizal fungus. Very few seeds become mature plants. For more information see Jones, Wapstra, Tonelli, Harris (1999): The Orchids of Tasmania.