Ancistrochilus rothschildianus O'Brien 1907 Photo courtesy of © Lourens Grobler.

Another Flower Photo courtesy of Jay Pfahl

Flower Closeup Photo courtesy of Danny Lentz

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Common Name or Meaning Rothschild's Ancistrochilus

Flower Size 2" to 3" [5.5 cm]

A sympodial, epiphytic plant, with pseudobulbs that look like Hershey's kisses. It is a cool to hot grower from Guinea, Sierra Leone and across to Uganda on bare trunks and larger branches of large forest trees at elevations of 500 to 1100 meters that can be potted and watered regularly while growing and less when not. This small to medium sized epiphyte has clustered, conical or pyriform pseudobulbs with 2 apical, lanceolate to elliptic lanceolate or oblanceolate, acute or acuminate, broad, thin textured leaves and blooms on a basal, arching, to 8" long, pubescent inflorescence, from from the base of the leafed or leafless psuedobulb and can carry 2 to 5, large, fragrant flowers occuring in the winter, summer and fall.

Synonyms Ancistrochilus thomsonianus var. gentilii De Wild. 1903; Ancistrochilus hirsutissimus Kraenzl. 1914 ; Pachystoma rothschildiana (O'Brien) Sander 1927

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Manual of Orchids Stewart 1995; Simon & Schuster's Guide to Orchids Fanfani & Rossi 1988; Miniature Orchids Northern 1988; Manual of Cultivated Orchids Bechtel, Cribb, Laurent 1992; The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Orchds Pridgeon 1992; Flora's Orchids Nash and La Croix 2005; Botanica's Orchids Laurel Glenn 2002; African Orchids in the wild and Cultivation La Croix 1997;