Unplanned visit to West Head - new season orchids found : April 8 2026

There was a plan for the day. Drive to pick up tennis shoes and then drive for a walk for autumn orchids. Did not work out that way - car would not start. Had failed to check the interior light switch was not active when I parked up

Do have a jump start pack - eventually got the car going and happy to idle at the traffic lights. Chose a long run into the eastern side of Ku-ring Gai Chase NP. Out and a loop to get back without stopping. Parked up at a known walking track that has a parking spot that aims downhill

Banksia triplets

Grey spider grevillea - end of season but in great condition

Pocked mushroom form

Narrow-leafed hemigenia - a lot flowering

This pink flower caught my eye. It is a wax flower but iNat cannot pin it down. Maybe someone will help

Just off the track is this important Aboriginal site - high up with views across the valley - carvings in the rock - a sea creature and the tessellations cut in

Always captures me as a place of spirit

Peach-flowered tea tree - lots flowering

Pea flower - a flash of yellow and gold

Found one darwinia flowering - always find them this side of the park

The tessellations talk

Tiny flowers growing out of the moss banks on the rock. The shape suggests they are a version of leptospermum

I did know to scour the moss banks especially under the mini-bushes for orchids - a budding greenhood

A forest of green spikes - the greenhoods in waiting

Seeded midge orchid with enough life left to say it is a fringed midge orchid

Did find one flowering - just one - corunastylis fimbriatus

Closing up form - the fringe withers leaving the sepals showing and folding in

More than one there were

And hiding under cover was one greenhood flowering. Pterostylis daintreana - this alone made the battery problem worth it

Two flowers and a bud or two above

More front on shot - pterostylis daintreana

Also a cluster of cryptostylis orchids growing on top of the rock

The real feature of the rock platform is the mini-trees that grow here. Nature's own bonsai

NSW coral heath flower.

Walked a long way down Elvina Track hoping to find parson's bands orchids in the grassy bits. No luck there. One set of flowers confused by the warm days - patersonsia iris - saw a few

Fab little star flower - lost petals form below

Pink spider grevillea

Hibbertia flower

Purple fan flower closes out the out of season show.

Good news is the car did start. Stopped to buy boerewors - a South African sausage. That for dinner
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Daily Activity, House Chores, Photowalking, Shopping

Height 183 cm		Weight 90 kg		Body Fat %
Waist cm		Thighs cm		Chest cm