Scientific Name: Pyrorchis nigricans

Common Name: fire orchid

Family Classification (Clade): Monocots

Family: Orchidaceae

Form Description: Colony forming orchid with a large fleshy heart-shaped ground-hugging basal leaf. The plants turn black on drying.

Height (m): 0.05 – 0.3

Flowers: Up to 8 flowers, 2-3cm across, white with prominent dark reddish stripes; large strongly hooded dorsal sepal and a whitish deeply fringed labellum.

Municipality
Break O’DayCircular HeadDorsetFlindersGeorge TownKing IslandLatrobeTasman
Plant Communities
Coastal VegetationGrasslandHeathSedgeland and Wetland
Habitat Notes

Heathy eucalypt woodland, teatree scrub, sedgeland and heathland on moderately to well-drained sandy soils. Widespread and locally abundant in coastal and near coastal lowland on the Tasman Peninsula and in northern Tasmania, including Bass Strait Is. In most areas plants flower only in the season following summer fire.

Site Tolerance

Dry, Exposed

Soil Tolerance

Nutrient-poor, Sandy, Well-drained

Frost Tolerance

Tender

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.