A worldwide community photographing and learning about wildlife
Project Noah Nature School
Lophiaris crispiflora
Broad-leaved epiphytic wild orchid. The flowers are small, less than 10mm across, on a long stem with 8 flower buds.
Found growing on a dead branch in an orange tree in a pretty shady spot.
Found this orchid growing on a dead branch of an orange tree. Broke the branch off and tied it to a tree close to my house So that I can keep a closer eye on it and because the branch would have rotted off in the course of another year or two anyway. I couldn't find any ID on this. Maybe some out there knows what species it is.
Update-this orchid has grown a lot over the last 3 years and mature plants will have upwards of 60 flowers per inflorescence. They are pollinated by a small brownish-bronzy colored bee, not the typical metallic green ones that pollinate many of the orchids here.
StirredMocha, thanks for pointing me in the right direction. After doing a search on Lophairis carthagensis I came upon a spanish paper describing how that species has been split into several other species based on their geographic range. If I understand the paper correctly, my spanish isn't that great, then this is Lophiaris crispiflora. The paper can be found here, http://www.cicy.mx/sitios/desde_herbario...
Thanks for pointing me towards Orchid Species Journal. I have quite a few wild orchids from this area that would be nice to get an ID on.
Fantastic orchid Sigg! I'm not sure of the ID but there is a great FB group called Orchid species journal, with a lot of experts. I've gotten many ID's there.
Spotted on Jul 6, 2014
Submitted on Jul 15, 2014
