I headed up to Springwood and met Wendy and then Don and we drove in Wendy’s car to Blackheath and then down to Megalong to look for Fairy Lanterns. A friend, Greg, had recently posted some photos of these unusual plants on his Facebook page. So we knew they would be in flower. I had previously seen one of the species before – back in April 2015 on a field trip with the Sydney Fungal Studies Group Inc.
Fairy Lanterns are the flowers of the genus Thismia. These are very strange plants. They grow underground and obtain all their nutrients from a fungal partner. The fungal partner is also in a mycorrhizal relationship with another plant – in this case, a vine that often grows in the rainforest.
When there are good conditions for fungal fruiting – just after lots of rain, then as fungi appear above the ground, the flowers of the Thismia also appear in the leaf litter. The flowers are very small and would be easy to overlook.
Often the flowers appear in a small cluster – which suggests they may all be connected underground to the one plant.
On our visit, we were met by Greg and his daughter Eli, which proved to be very good – as I don’t think we would have found the flowers by ourselves.
There are two spices of Thismia which are found in Megalong. One has been known for a while – Thismia hillii. The second is Thismia megalongensis, which was only found about 6 years ago, and so far has only been found in Megalong. Greg was one of the authors of the original paper that described the species. Every year since they were discovered, Greg has made field trips and seen the flowers appear each season. They seem to flower anytime between December and May – depending on rain. Greg told us the flowers are fertilised by a fungal gnat.
These ones are Thismia megalongensis –
And these are Thismia hillii –
The T hillii are more salmon coloured than the T megalongensis, and they lack a “bristle” from the top of the flower that the T megalongensis has. On our visit, we found far fewer T hillii than T megalongensis.
We also found some fruiting bodies –
I had seen one of these before on a fungi photography visit but had not realised what it was until Greg suggested it was likely to be a Thismia fruit.
As well as the Thismia, we did see a number of species of fungi –
The Thismia are really extraordinary plants and seeing two species and so many at different stages was a rare privilege. Many thanks to Greg for showing us where to look.