4 orchids and a smelly dog

When we started on our walk with the dog this morning I called in to see how our large - 60+ plants - colony of Cyanicula caerulea (the blue not-Caladenia) were going.  The short answer is that they have gone for this year.  However I did find my first Stegostyla sp. for the year on our property.  I will take a punt on it being S. ustulata in view of the absence of purple on the visible areas.
A PARENTHESIS FROM THE AFTERNOON
I thought I should go back and see what else I could find in the afternoon.  First off, I proved that "...to everything there is a season ..." (attribute to Ecclesiastes or the Byrds as you wish, but the Byrds have a better melody line).  So it is with orchids: I found quite a few more S. ustulata and got down and close:
Then as I neared our house I found this:
I believed that to be S. cucullata but a couple of folk whose opinions I completely respect have explained that it is still S ustulata - see comments for details.

Somewhat later in the morning walk I stumbled across our first Diuris chryseopsis for the year.  We tend to have very few of these but this was in the usual spot.
Glossodia major are common on the property (there are currently about 100 flowers in the main colony) and have been around for a couple of weeks.  However it made a nice addition to the collection for the day.
Next to the Glossodia, was a single Cyanicula caerulea.
As well as the orchids we found our first significant outbreak of members of the Fabaceae.  This is, I think' Dillwynnia sieberi which I have only found once or twice before on the property.  Today we found three plants in a small area.
 The patch of Daviesia mimosoides was also coming out into serious flower.
 We have one patch of Clematis microphylla which is coming nicely into flower.
In between all this excitement I was a little concerned when the small dog slumped over and writhed on the ground.  However she arose and trotted on with no concern.  I concluded that something had parked a coil on the ground and it required rolling in.  Somewhat later in the walk the process was repeated and this time "Essence du Reynard" was detectable through both visual and olfactory senses.  Probably also taste, but I wasn't going to go there!

So job #1 was to decon-Tammie-nate the beast.
 Applying a towel got rid of much of the surplus water and shampoo.
 Earlier in the day Frances had noticed a brown pile on the lawn which I initially identified as where said small dog had been digging after wascally wabbits or wodents the previous day.  On going to look more closely the excavation was more significant.  Obviously one of the local wombats had decided to deepen the hole.
 Hopefully a 20kg rock will persuade it to go somewhere else!
After positioning the rock this rather attractive blowie turned up nearby.  From Brisbane Insects I have tentatively identified it as Calliphora (Neocalliphora) ochracea.

Comments

Denis Wilson said…
Nice post.
I almost choose to give up on the Stegostylas.
Lovely plants, but massively inconsistent, and I refuse to believe that close plants are separate species, just because some show purple dots and others do not. After all, to be a true species, surely they require different genetics, and therefore separate parentage.
That's why I give up.
I haven't yet seen any here, this year.
Cheers
Denis
30 September 2013 at 17:27:00 GMT+10
Flabmeister said…
Thanks Denis. I tend to agree with you about speciation of most things. I recently got a paper about speciation in honeyeaters using DNA analysis and found I couldn't understand a word of the methodology section.

I reckon there is a really good PhD in linguistcs lurking the field. The topic could be attempting to translate such bovine faeces into English. A good title for the work might be "Following Hans Christian Anderson: The Emperor's new DNA"
30 September 2013 at 17:53:00 GMT+10
Flabmeister said…
Received by email (1):

I think that the proposed S. cucullata is in fact a colourful S. ustulata. The flower structure is identical to the paler one. S. cucullata has smaller cream coloured, rather wiry looking flowers. Scent is a good indicator. S. ustulata has virtually no scent but may smell slightly musky on the warmest days. S. cucullata is scented, the description of which is not easy but often citrus like. S. cucullata usually begins to flowers as S. ustulata finishes and they often occur at the same sites so you may yet be in luck.
30 September 2013 at 20:55:00 GMT+10
Flabmeister said…
Received by email 2:

Look at the p233 and p237 of THE book and you will see the flatten labellum of S ustalata is notched on the side lobe of the labellum that go back to where it meets the dorsal sepal while S cucullata has very few side lobes and they do not go back that far. In fact the side lobes of S cucullata are quite smooth as are S moschata.

It is also very early for S cucullata, even though the season is very early this year.
30 September 2013 at 20:56:00 GMT+10
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