Dipodium pictum, commonly known as brittle climbing-orchid or climbing hyacinth-orchid,[4] is an orchid species that is native to Malesia (including Indonesia and New Guinea) and the Cape York Peninsula in Australia.[5]
Dipodium pictum is a slender vine with leaves that are arranged in a single plane These have overlapping bases and are about 30 to 40 cm long and 2 to 3 cm wide. The flowers are about 5 cm in diameter and have maroon spots.[5]
The species was formally described in 1849 in The Journal of the Horticultural Society of London by English botanist John Lindley who gave it the name Wailesia picta.[6] It was transferred to the genus Dipodium by German botanist Heinrich Gustav Reichenbach in 1862.[2]
Dipodium pandanum, a species formally described by Frederick Manson Bailey in 1902, is treated as a synonym of Dipodium pictum in the Australian Plant Census.[3] However, the World Checklist of Selected Plant Families records it as a synonym of Dipodium scandens.[7] The type specimen for Dipodum pandanum was collected near Samarai in Papua New Guinea.[5]
In Australia it is found within or on the edge of rainforest, often near watercourses, at altitudes ranging from 200 to 400 metres. Only four specimens have been recorded in Australia; from Kutini-Payamu National Park and a timber reserve in the McIlwraith Range on the Cape York Peninsula.[4]
In Australia, the species is listed as "endangered" under the Commonwealth Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act as well as Queensland's Nature Conservation Act.[8]
Dipodium pictum, commonly known as brittle climbing-orchid or climbing hyacinth-orchid, is an orchid species that is native to Malesia (including Indonesia and New Guinea) and the Cape York Peninsula in Australia.
