From the Latin cruento (stained or spotted with blood), in reference to the floral colour patterns.

Kermerton Donkey Orchid.

Leaves 2 or 3, 100–150 × 7–10 mm, folded. Flower stem 250–400 mm tall, 1–7-flowered. Flowers 25–35 mm across, pale yellow to yellow with red to red-brown markings, exterior surface of all segments stained or marked with red-brown; petals yellowish brown, dorsal sepal heavily stained with red-brown, commonly with a yellowish central area, labellum lobes heavily marked and stained with red or red-brown, lateral sepals brown with green tips. Dorsal sepal erect, 6–10 × 9–14 mm. Lateral sepals deflexed, crossed and recurved, 14–20 × 2–3 mm. Petals obliquely erect; stalk 3–7 mm long, curved, blackish; blade ovate, 10–18 × 8–12 mm. Labellum 7–10 mm long; lateral lobes 7–10 × 4–6 mm; midlobe convex, margins downcurved, broadly wedge-shaped when flattened, 7–10 × 7–9 mm. Callus ridge 1, 3–4 mm long, yellow.

Spring flowering; flowers 25–35 mm across, pale yellow, lacking any purple colouration, dorsal sepal and labellum with red to reddish brown markings; lateral sepals to 20 mm long.

Flowers August–October.

Native.

W.A. (Lake Clifton to Capel); 10–100 m altitude.

Commonly grows in Banksia woodland in freely draining sand, occasionally in seasonally wet soil.

Flowers freely without fire.

Named in 2016 based on specimens collected by Chris French in 1995 from Kermerton, W.A.

D.L. Jones, A Complete Guide to Native Orchids of Australia 3rd edn: 247 (2021).

Jones, D.L. (2021). A Complete Guide to Native Orchids of Australia 3rd edn. (Reed New Holland: Sydney).

Published 10 June 2022. This profile has been adapted from A Complete Guide to Native Orchids of Australia 3rd edn (2021) by D.L. Jones, with support from the Australian Orchid Foundation.