Teacher and amateur botanist Nick Lambert has found about 50 Bonville leafless orchids growing in rainforest near Boambee, on the New South Wales Mid North Coast, ABC News reports. Until now the critically endangered species was known from a single site about five kilometres away, where only six to 17 plants show up in any year.
The find takes the known number of plants from roughly six last year to more than 60. The orchid has no leaves at all: it draws its nutrients from a fungus in the soil and appears above ground for just a week or two each year. Because it cannot be grown in cultivation, protecting wild plants is the only way to save it.
Botanist Lachlan Copeland, who first described the species, confirmed the find. Better still, the new site lies inside the planned Great Koala National Park, and scientists say a second population is valuable for the orchid’s genetic diversity.
Source: ABC News