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Diuris fragrantissima
Fragrant doubletail is a rare tuberous terrestrial orchid from grassland west of Melbourne, Australia, with white flowers marked mauve. It is critically threatened in the wild and is seldom grown outside specialist conservation collections, so there is little practical home-garden care to follow.
Diuris fragrantissima, commonly called fragrant doubletail or Sunshine diuris, is a species of orchid which is endemic to a small area to the west of Melbourne. It has two linear leaves at its base and up to twelve white flowers with mauve or pale purple markings with unusually long lateral sepals. Only about thirty plants survive in grassland near Sunshine.
At the time of European settlement, D. fragrantissima was plentiful in the grasslands to the west of Melbourne, but as early as 1934, W.H. Nicholls noted that it had become scarce. The population continued to decline until only one plant survived in the wild in 1992. About thirty wild plants of Diuris fragrantissima survive in grassland near Sunshine and others have been introduced to a small reserve near Altona. The populations at both Sunshine and Altona are under great stress due to the encroachment of industrial and residential development. Ecological processes such as the loss of natural pollinators also threaten this species. About 200 individuals survive in cultivation, mostly at Melbourne Zoo and the Royal Botanic Gardens Victoria.
Lemon doubletail · Buttercup doubletail · White donkey orchid · Diuris amabilis · Giant donkey orchid · Tomaree donkey orchid · Golden Donkey Orchid · Little golden moths · Golden Cowslips · Diuris brachyscapa · Diuris bracteata · Short-leaved donkey orchid
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Diuris fragrantissima by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
