Calanthe nguyenthinhii Aver. 2018 SUBGENUS Calanthe SECTION Calanthe

Photo by © Leonid Averyanov and Taiwania 63(3) New Orchids (Orchidaceae: Epidendroideae and Vandoideae) in the Flora of Vietnam Averyanov, Van Canh NGUYEN, Hoang Tuan NGUYEN, Ba Vuong TRUONG, Phi Tam NGUYEN, Sinh Khang NGUYEN, Tatiana V. MAISAK, Hiep Tien NGUYEN, Duc Nam BUI, Xuan Canh CHU 2018

EARLIER

Common Name Nguyen Thinh's Calanthe [Nguyen Van Thinh, Vietnamese orchid explorer and grower from Dalat town, Lam Dong province]

Flower Size .4 to .6" [1 to 1.5 cm]

Found in Vietnam in primary and secondary evergreen broad-leaved montane forest on granite at elevations around 1600 meters as a large sized, cool growing terrestrial with a very short, insignificant rhizome giving rise to abbreviated, densely clustered, dull green, touching each other, erect, slightly swelling, narrowly conoid stems covered by light green broadening leaf bases or their whitish fibrous remnants and carrying 3 to 7, subglabrous above, finely puberulent below, sessile, imbricate, blade dark velvety green, ovate elliptic, plicate, wavy along margin, acute to acuminate at the apex,narrowing into the light greeen, petiolate-like base leaves that blooms in the earlier fall on an erect, arising from the apical part of stem, peduncle light green, soft densely puberulent, 18 to 44" [45 to 110 cm] long, provided with 3 to 8, distant, diminishing from the base of peduncle toward the apex, narrowly ovate to narrowly triangular acuminate, herbaceous sterile bracts, rachis puberulent, 1.6 to 3.6" [4 to 9 cm] long, spirally arranged, densely cylindric, many flowered inflorescence with persistent, puberulent, horizontally directed, olive-green, later dull brownish, ovate to narrowly triangular, acute to shortly acuminate, much shorter than the ovary floral bracts.

"The new species belongs to a group of related species from the sect. Calanthe with large, well developed subradical leaves, erect abbreviated stem and long, erect subapical inflorescence bearing short terminal raceme. In Vietnam, this group includes such widespread and common species as C. argenteostriata C.Z. Tang et S.J. Cheng, C. herbacea Lindl., C. leonidii P.J. Cribb et D.A. Clayton, C. odora Griff. and C. triplicata (Willemet) Ames (Clayton and Cribb, 2013). Among them, our plant has the closest relation to C. triplicata and C. leonidii, but strikingly differs in proportionally very long inflorescence, much dense raceme (vs. raceme subdense or lax), short pedicel and ovary .32 to .52" [0.8 to 1.3 cm] long vs. 1 to 1.6" [2.5 to 4 cm] long, smaller flowers with sepals .26 to .34" [6.5 to 8.5 mm] and lip .38 to .5" [9.5 to 12.5 mm] long vs. sepals .4 to .48" [10 to 12 mm] and lip .48 to .72" [12 to 18 mm] long, shorter spur .52 to .6" [1.3 to 1.5 cm] long vs. about .8" [2 cm] long, lobules of median lip lobe straight, down directed, parallel each other (vs. lobules of median lip lobe strongly divergent) and in prominent 3-lobed callus and numerous, fat brightly yellow protuberances on lip disc near the lip base (disc more or less warty or tuberculate, but with no prominent 3-lobed callus and numerous finger-like papillae). Most probably, the new species is locally endemic with very limited distribution in the western mountain slopes of the Bidoup Mountains." Averyanov etal 2018

Synonyms

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; *Taiwania 63(3) New Orchids (Orchidaceae: Epidendroideae and Vandoideae) in the Flora of Vietnam Averyanov, Van Canh NGUYEN, Hoang Tuan NGUYEN, Ba Vuong TRUONG, Phi Tam NGUYEN, Sinh Khang NGUYEN, Tatiana V. MAISAK, Hiep Tien NGUYEN, Duc Nam BUI, Xuan Canh CHU 2018 photo fide

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