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Beautiful and truly bizarre, the gnome plant is a rarely seen and poorly understood resident of the coastal rainforest.

Lacking stems or leaves, this plant briefly emerges from the soil in dense clusters of pink flowers with yellow centers, resembling the little rosettes of icing that decorate birthday cakes.

The lack of leaf or any trace of green on the gnome plant reveals that this is a myco-heterotroph: a strange guild of plants that includes the ghost pipe and groundcone that do not photosynthesize like other plants. Rather than spinning its own sugars from sunlight, the gnome plant taps into the complex network of mycorrhizal fungi under the forest floor and steals the solar energy they’ve traded from the trees. A beautiful parasite!

Look closely at this plant’s densely clustered flowers, and you will see the petals are covered in tiny hairs. Though no one is entirely certain what species of insect pollinates the flower, the dense hairs suggest the gnome plant is choosy about its accomplices, with the hairs perhaps screening out small insects looking to steal nectar while allowing a moth with an extended proboscis to be its sole customer. The small fruits of the gnome plant are said to have a somewhat “cheese-like” odour, which some believe may attract small rodents that can spread the seeds of this strange being across the forest floor.

Rare and understudied, the gnome plant is one of countless examples of the magic and mystery in our ancient, complex forest ecosystems. In the shadows of the coastal rainforest, it carries out its cryptic relationships with fungi, insects, and rodents, a strange and beautiful node in a web of connectivity. When forest ecosystems are destroyed through logging, we unweave these fragile life networks, often without comprehending what is lost.

Your best chance of encountering the mysterious gnome plant blooms is during the summer months, so keep your eyes peeled!