拟石斛属 ni shi hu shu

Authors:Authors: Xinqi Chen & Jeffrey J. Wood

Herbs, epiphytic or lithophytic, erect, repent, or pendulous. Rhizome short; roots wiry. Stem not swollen, covered in distichous leaf bases. Leaves equitant, iridiform, rigid, with an abscission layer at apex of conduplicate leaf sheath. Inflorescences subterminal or lateral, simple or compound, flowering successively; floral bracts persistent, often forming dense tufts. Flowers not opening widely, fleshy, rigid; ovary almost sessile. Dorsal sepal free, rigid; lateral sepals obliquely triangular, forming a distinct mentum with column foot. Lip very fleshy, entire, hinged to apex of column foot, saccate at base, with a conic subapical wart below, secreting sticky liquid at base and along grooved adaxial surface. Column short; foot longer than column proper; pollinia 4, in pairs, attached to prominent caudicles.

About 38 species: widely distributed from SE Asia to New Guinea and the Solomon Islands; one species (endemic) in China.