Guardian Nature School Team Contact Blog Project Noah Facebook Project Noah Twitter

A worldwide community photographing and learning about wildlife

Join Project Noah!
nature school apple icon

Project Noah Nature School visit nature school

Cacho de Toro - The Trumpet Player's Orchid

Myrmecophila tibicinis

Description:

A giant sized, warm to hot growing epiphyte and sometimes lithophyte with several leaves that is found from Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, Costa Rica, Venezuela and Colombia , it has huge, 18" [45 cm],hollow, sulcate, conic to cylindric psuedobulbs that are hollow and have a entrance at the base so that in the wild always has ants living in them. There are 2 to 5 apical, elliptic-ovate leaves. These plants bloom in March or April and can be grown with year round watering although it is better to give less through the winter. These plants must be mounted on a large wood mount as they do not like to be disturbed, and it does not take long for it to cover a branch. They have up to 15' [450 cm] long, erect, paniculate spikes with the successively opening, fragrant flowers in a cluster at the apex so thought must be put into space so the spikes don't get broken. It can be confused with M brysiana but differs in having larger magenta flower with a larger column while M brysiana has much smaller yellow flowers with shorter columns.

Habitat:

Its found in seasonally dry deciduous forests on trunks and larger branches often in full sun at elevations of 300 to 600 meters

Notes:

The dried pseudobulbs of this species can be fashioned to make a trumpet to call the children home from their playtime hence the common name.

Species ID Suggestions



Sign in to suggest organism ID

No Comments

Herb
Spotted by
Herb

Minatitlán, Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave, Mexico

Spotted on May 11, 2015
Submitted on May 11, 2015

Related Spottings

Orquidea Myrmecophila orchid Myrmecophila orchid Orquidea

Nearby Spottings

Mormolyca Roble Amarillo o Guayacán Spotting Araña Cangrejito - Crab Spider
Noah Guardians
Noah Sponsors
join Project Noah Team

Join the Project Noah Team