Citation: R. Rogers, Trans. R. Soc. S. Aust. 33:16, t. 33 (1909).

Synonymy: Arachnorchis ovata, Phlebochilus ovata, Phlebochilus ovatus (amend.)

Common name: Ovate (or Kangaroo Island) spider-orchid.

Description:
Slender, hairy, 10-23 cm high; leaf very hairy, 3-7 cm long, narrow-lanceolate or oblong-lanceolate.

Flowers usually solitary, occasionally 2, large, reddish-yellow or wholly red; sepals with a dark central stripe, dilated in their basal half thereafter contracted into very fine clavate caudae; dorsal sepal 2-2.7 cm long, erect or slightly incurved over the column; lateral sepals rather longer, spreading; petals shorter than the sepals, lanceolate, not clubbed, spreading; labellum ovate, on a short movable claw, lamina 9-10 mm long and c. 8 mm wide, reddish-yellow with a dark-red tip, moderately recurved from about the middle, margin entire, lamina with dark divergent veins; calli extending to about the bend, but very variable, in 2 or 4 rows, sometimes represented by a few minute irregularly placed bosses, occasionally entirely absent, generally small and papillate except for a few short clavate ones near the claw; column c. 8 mm long, rather incurved, more winged in its upper than lower half; 2 yellow sessile calli at the base.

Published illustration: Fiveash & Lothian (1974) Australian orchids, pl. 13.

Distribution:  Occurs singly or in small groupps in hard yellow duplex soil over laterite in thick scrub and associated with Eucalyptus baxteri and Xanthorrhoea semiplana subsp. tateana. S.Aust.: SL, KI. Conservation status: native Flowering time: Sept. — Oct.

SA Distribution Map based on current data relating to specimens held in the State Herbarium of South Australia

Biology: Very close to C. leptochila and intermediates do Occur.

Author: Not yet available