Bunochilus montanus

Montane Leafy Greenhood at Uriarra Village, ACT

Bunochilus montanus at Uriarra Village, ACT - 14 Oct 2015
Bunochilus montanus at Uriarra Village, ACT - 14 Oct 2015
Bunochilus montanus at Uriarra Village, ACT - 14 Oct 2015
Bunochilus montanus at Uriarra Village, ACT - 14 Oct 2015
Bunochilus montanus at Uriarra Village, ACT - 14 Oct 2015
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Identification history

Bunochilus montanus 19 Oct 2015 TobiasHayashi
Bunochilus umbrinus 15 Oct 2015 TonyWood
Bunochilus umbrinus 15 Oct 2015 KenT

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Significant sighting

MichaelMulvaney noted:

15 Oct 2015

A new recorded location for an orchid for which there are less than ten recorded locations in the ACT, thanks Ken

User's notes

First three images each from a different plant

6 comments

TonyWood wrote:
   16 Oct 2015
Not easy to separate this B. umbrinus and B. montanus. Some of the plants found in the Brindabellas seem intermediate between the two species.
TobiasHayashi wrote:
   17 Oct 2015
At a risk of reviving a similar debate from a little while back, this looks more like B. montanus to me than B umbrinus...
TonyWood wrote:
   17 Oct 2015
I'm happy to call this B. montanus, given the location. Concerning the earlier debate I sought DLJ's view but got no response. Just to confuse things further, it was once called B. melagrammus.
KenT wrote:
   17 Oct 2015
I have added a couple of extra images which may or may not help in determining this species. Unfortunately I have no useful key to the Pterostylis group and without an ability to compare with type specimens or vouchered collections I’m having to rely on the descriptions and illustrations presented in the ‘Field guide to the orchids of the ACT’. The time of flowering of early to mid-October, its presence among grasses on a road cutting verge that looked like it was cut into a krasnozem soil, the thin leaves (about 3 mm) and the overall shape and colouration of the labellum had me favouring Bunochilus umbrinus. However, I’m not an orchid person I find the level of variability within a species, the seemingly sometimes arbitrary ways of distinguishing between species too confusing and I’m happy to leave that to you guys with the decades of experience with this difficult group of plants.
TonyWood wrote:
   18 Oct 2015
Originally all the local material was called Pterostylis longifolia or P. aff. longifolia. Then the plants at lower altitudes (Black Mountain etc) was descibed as a new species, Bunochilus umbrinus. Material found at higher elevations (eg Tidbinbilla, Brindabellas) was for a time called B. melagrammus before being renamed as B. montanus. To add confusion, Jones made reference to an earlier flowering variant of B. montanus which he thought was probably an undescribed species. But never mind, names may change but the plants stay the same.
TobiasHayashi wrote:
   20 Oct 2015
Hi Ken, fairly confident this is montanus, or perhaps more likely aff montanus (whether or not they are different, who knows), and I've changed the ID to reflect this. The variability as you say, coupled with the diversity, can be quite hard to untangle. B. umbrinus have larger flowers with fatter lateral sepals. The labellum is relatively narrower with less of an obvious ridge at the top. Leaf size tends to vary a lot I find, and flowering time is getting earlier than it was back in the day (apparently). Plus, as Tony mentioned, there is a spring flowering Bunochilus in the Brindabellas.

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Location information

Sighting information

  • 4 Abundance
  • 14 Oct 2015 01:33 PM Recorded on
  • KenT Recorded by

Species information

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  • Nearby sighting(s) of same species
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