Bulbophyllum ustulatum Aver. 2018 SECTION Brachystachyae Benth. & Hook. f. 1883

Photo by © N. Orlov and Phytotaxa 369 (1) Averyanov etal 2018: New species of Bulbophyllum (Orchidaceae)

EARLY EARLY

Common Name The Black Inflorescence Bulbophyllum

Flower Size

Found in northern Vietnam in primary evergreen broad-leaved montane forests on granite at elevations of 2400 to 2500 meters as a small sized, cold growing epiphyte with a semi-woody, dull yellowish, short, creeping rhizome giving rise to densely crowded, green, subglobise, smooth pseudobulbs carrying a single, apical, erect, leathery to rigid, oblong broadly lanceolate to oblong narrowly obovate, obtuse, narrowing into grooved petiole-like base leaf that blooms in the fall on a basal, peduncle erect, arching, 6.4 to 11.2" [16 to 28 cm] long, long, green in basal half, dark purple-brown toward the apex, provided with 3 to 5 broad papyraceous sheathing bracts near base, rachis nodding, at base with one large involucral sheathing acute bract, pink to dark purple, fleshy, 2 to 4" [5 to 10 cm] long, dense, spirally arranged, simultaneously many flowered inflorescence with purple, herbaceous, deltoid to triangular, acute, straight, slightly concave, slightly shorter than median sepal floral bracts and carrying non resupinate flowers.

"The new species belongs to SECTION Brachystachyae Benth. & Hook. f. 1883 and is allied to some Himalayan taxa, namely Bulbophyllum conchiferum Reichenbach , B. cylindraceum Lindley and B. khasyanum Griffith (. Similarly, to these species, our plant possesses very small pseudobulbs, elongate, nodding, spadix-like, dense inflorescence with small sessile, flattened, overlapping flowers densely appressed to rather fleshy rachis. Among the mentioned species, the new species may be most close to B. conchiferum undeservedly regarded as a synonym of B. khasyanum (Pearce & Cribb 2002), which type specimen has short, almost head-like spike. Inflorescence and flowers of B. ustulata fits well the excellent analytical drawing presented on type herbarium specimen of B. conchiferum stored at K [K000894441] in elongate rachis, dense, shell-like sessile flowers, acuminate, revolute apex of median sepal, acuminate recurved petals, 2-keeled lip and long stelidia. However, our plant differs from B. conchiferum in large involucral sheathing bract at the base of rachis (a feature that is also observed in typical samples of B. cylindraceum), glandular hairy median sepal, straight stelidia (vs. stelidia at the middle upward bent) and fleshy inflated margin of stigma close to the base of column foot." Averyanov 2018

Synonyms

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; * Phytotaxa 369 (1) Averyanov etal 2018: New species of Bulbophyllum (Orchidaceae) drawing/photo fide

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