Genoplesium mucronatum (Rupp) M.A.M.Renner APNI* Description: Terrestrial tuberous herb.
Leaf to 12 cm long.
Flowers porrect, green and reddish purple, around 5.0 mm wide across the maximum spread of the lateral sepals. Dorsal sepal reddish purplish, margins around the apex slightly darker; 2.0–2.5 mm long, broadly-ovate, concave, margins entire, abruptly contracted into an acuminate apex. Lateral sepals green with maroon suffused base in flower bud, darkening slightly with flower opening and age but still bicolorous with maroon suffused base and brown-green upper half, 3.0 mm long, linear-lanceolate, concave toward apex, apex acute and bearing a small clavate gland. Petals maroon, paler toward base, 2.0 mm long, lanceolate ‘or almost rhomboid’, apex acuminate and usually with a filiform point, margins entire or minutely serrulate; greenish at base and maroon toward apex. Labellum reddish-purple, 3.0 mm long, oblong with a rounded mucronate apex; margins with numerous short ciliola, slightly longer toward apex; callus reddish-purple, channeled near the base. Column wings equally bilobed, lobes obtuse, lower lobe margin shortly ciliolate. Anther obtuse, with a filiform rostrum. Stigma oval.
Flowering: March.
Distribution and occurrence: New South Wales. Genoplesium mucronatum has been observed growing on the Central Coast of New South Wales, including around Wahroonga, near Appin.
NSW subdivisions: CC
Genoplesium mucronatum can be distinguished from other Genoplesium species by the combination of 1) entire dorsal sepal margins, 2) entire petal margins, 3) shortly ciliolate labellum margins, 4) short oblong labellum with a rounded and conspicuously mucronate apex, 5) the long filiform tips on (most) petals, 6) the relatively small, porrect flowers, 7) the lateral sepals spreading, but not held erect, and bearing a small clavate gland at their apex. Genoplesium mucronatum has been regarded as a synonym of a broadly circumscribed G. rufum (see Jones and Clements 1989; Jones 1993), but the two species differ in details of flower morphology and recognition of G. mucronatum as distinct from G. rufum is warranted, as detailed in Jones and French (2017) and Jones (2021).
Text by Text from Rupp HMR (1948) The section Genoplesium in the genus Prasophyllum (Orchidaceae). The Victorian Naturalist 65(6): 145 with modification by Matthew Renner 20 July 2023.
Taxon concept: Jones, D.L. & French, C.J. (2017), New combinations in Pterostylis and Corunastylis (Orchidaceae). Australian Orchid Review 82(3): 63
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