火炬兰属 huo ju lan shu

Authors:Authors: Xinqi Chen & Jeffrey J. Wood

Herbs, epiphytic, small, monopodial. Stems very short, enclosed in basal leaf sheaths. Leaves few to several, basal, distichous, flat, narrowly oblong to lanceolate, jointed and shortly sheathing at base, apex often unequally bilobed. Inflorescences lateral, usually shorter than leaves, often many borne simultaneously on a plant; peduncle longer than rachis, slender, both usually prickly-hairy, with 1 or 2 flowers open at a time; rachis usually thickened, rather short; floral bracts persistent. Flowers ephemeral, opening widely, to 1.5 cm in diam. Sepals and petals free, similar, spreading. Petals narrower than sepals; lip movably attached to end of column foot, spurred, ± 3-lobed; lateral lobes erect, narrow; mid-lobe often replicate on spur, sometimes with 2 basal lobules on both sides, with a small median tooth, giving a "4-lobed" appearance; spur broad, usually spreading forward, rarely pendulous. Column elongate, slender, bent forward at an obtuse angle at stigma base, with a rather long foot; rostellum elongate; pollinia 2, waxy, subglobose, entire, each with a caudicle attached by a common cuneate or triangular-cuneate stipe to a small triangular viscidium.

About ten species: India (Andaman Islands), Myanmar, Thailand, and Indochina to Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Philippines; one species in China.