Scientific Name: Corybas unguiculatus

Common Name: small pelican-orchid

Family Classification (Clade): Monocots

Family: Orchidaceae

Form Description: A tiny dark maroon helmet orchid. Distinctive leaf, heart-shaped, light greyish-green with purple underside.

Flowers: Single erect flower, 10-16 mm across. Bulbous dark maroon dorsal sepal that covers the fused upper margin of the tubular labellum with only the apex and lower half visible. In the Arthur River area, several sites have multiflowered plants with translucent pink or lime green flowers.

Municipality
Break O’DayCircular HeadClarenceDorsetFlindersGlamorgan-Spring BayKingboroughSorellTasman
Plant Communities
Coastal VegetationDry Eucalypt ForestHeath
Habitat Notes

Locally common in coastal woodland and heathland, often around the base of trees or stumps.

Propagation Calendar

  • Flowering Month
    Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
  • Seed Collecting Month
    Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
  • Sowing Month
    Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
  • Cutting Month
    Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
Propagation Method
Specialist Method

Seed Information

Seed Treatment Notes

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 thousands 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.