Hong Kong Spiranthes is a native terrestrial orchid of Hong Kong, favouring open grasslands that are humid and with abundant sunlight. It blooms from March to April each year, and is also distributed in South China, Japan, and Australia.

Hong Kong Spiranthes and Ladies Tresses (Spiranthes sinensis) are similar in appearance, and therefore all specimens were initially regarded as Ladies Tresses. However, following seven years of observation by botanist Professor Hu Shiu Ying and orchid expert Miss Gloria Barretto, Hong Kong Spiranthes was at last confirmed as a new species and named after “Hong Kong” (hongkongensis) in 1976. The most notable distinction between the two species is that the flowers of Hong Kong Spiranthes are covered with glandular hairs, whereas those of Ladies Tresses are glabrous.

With advances in technology, taxonomists began to make use of genetic identification techniques to compare phylogenetic relationships between species, and therefore revealed that Hong Kong Spiranthes is in fact the descendant of the natural hybrid of Ladies Tresses and Nepalese Ladies Tresses (S. flexuosa).