''Pterostylis cobarensis'', commonly known as the inland rustyhood or Cobar rustyhood is a plant in the orchid family Orchidaceae and is endemic to

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

. It has a rosette of leaves and between two and ten hairy, green and brown flowers with translucent white "windows" and a fleshy, insect-like labellum. It grows in inland areas of eastern Australia.

Description

''Pterostylis cobarensis'', is a terrestrial, perennial, deciduous,

herb In general use, herbs are a widely distributed and widespread group of plants, excluding vegetables and other plants consumed for macronutrients, with savory or aromatic properties that are used for flavoring and garnishing food, for medicinal ...

with an underground tuber. It has a rosette of between six and fifteen narrow elliptic leaves at the base of the flowering spike, each leaf long and wide. Up to fifteen green and brown flowers with translucent white "windows", each flower long and wide, are borne on a flowering spike tall. Three to five stem leaves are wrapped around the flowering spike. The dorsal sepal and

petal Petals are modified Leaf, leaves that surround the reproductive parts of flowers. They are often advertising coloration, brightly colored or unusually shaped to attract pollinators. All of the petals of a flower are collectively known as the ''c ...

s form a hood or "galea" over the column with the dorsal sepal having an upturned, thread-like point long. The lateral sepals turn downwards, shallowly dished with hairy edges and suddenly narrow to thin tips long spreading apart from each other. The labellum is thick, brownish or green, fleshy, insect-like, about long and wideand covered with short and long bristles. Flowering occurs from September to October.

Taxonomy and naming

''Pterostylis cobarensis'' was first formally described in 1989 by Mark Clements from a specimen collected near Cobar and the description was published in ''Australian Orchid Research''. The

specific epithet In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...

(''cobarensis'') alludes to the location of the

type Type may refer to: Science and technology Computing * Typing, producing text via a keyboard, typewriter, etc. * Data type, collection of values used for computations. * File type * TYPE (DOS command), a command to display contents of a file. * Ty ...

specimen.

Distribution and habitat

The inland rustyhood occurs mainly in New South Wales between

Broken Hill Broken Hill is an inland mining city in the far west of outback New South Wales, Australia. It is near the border with South Australia on the crossing of the Barrier Highway (A32) and the Silver City Highway (B79), in the Barrier Range. It is ...

, Nyngan and Young, growing in rocky places and in mallee, usually where runoff occurs. It also occurs in border regions in South Australia and on the Darling Downs in Queensland.

Conservation

''Pterostylis cobarensis'' is classified as ''vulnerable'' in New South Wales.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q15493247 cobarensis Endemic orchids of Australia Orchids of New South Wales Orchids of Queensland Orchids of South Australia Plants described in 1989