ORCHIDACEAE

Fawn Spider Orchid

 

0.25m - 0.40m (25-40cm) 

Flowers 1-2, fawn to pale tawny yellow, with pale reddish lines and darker sepaline caudae, labellum cream to yellowish, sometimes with red suffusions, calli dark red, column transluscent with reddish markings. 

Papery capsule 

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

Break O'Day; Burnie; Clarence; Derwent Valley; Glenorchy; Hobart; Huon Valley; Kingborough; Sorell; Southern Midlands; Tasman 

Coastal Vegetation; Dry Eucalypt Forest and Woodland; Heath 

Tas. endemic. Coastal scrub, heathland and open eucalypt forest. 

Dry; Exposed; Exposed; Shady 

 

Clay; Loam; Sandy; Well-drained 

Fire frequency moderate to high. Well represented in reserves. 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.