ORCHIDACEAE

Summer Fingers (orchid)

 

0.15m - 0.36m (15-26cm) 

Flowers 1-2 dull pink or whitish internally, with brownish central bands externally, labellum white or pink with prominant red transverse bars and yellow apex, calli yellow to orange, column whitish with red transverse bars. 

Papery capsule 

Leaf narrowly linear, dark green, red base, sparsely hairy. Scape slender and wiry, sparsely hairy. 

Break O'Day; Burnie; Clarence; Dorset; Flinders Island; Glamorgan-Spring Bay; Hobart; Huon Valley; King Island; Kingborough; Launceston; Meander Valley; Northern Midlands; Sorell; Southern Midlands; Tasman; West Coast 

Coastal Vegetation; Dry Eucalypt Forest and Woodland 

Found in coastal heathland and scrub but in Tas. more commonly in tall open eucalypt forest and eucalypt woodlands. 

Exposed; Exposed; Moist; Shady 

Moderate 

Clay; Fertile; Loam; Poorly-drained; Sandy; Well-drained 

Main habitat tends to be damp with few fires, may be intolerant to high fire frequency. 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.