杜鹃兰属 du juan lan shu

Authors:Authors: Xinqi Chen, Stephan W. Gale & Phillip J. Cribb

Herbs, terrestrial. Pseudobulbs cormlike, ovoid or cylindric, noded, with many fibrous, elongate roots at base and a coralloid rhizome beneath. Leaves 1 or 2, or rarely plants leafless (in which case holomycotrophic), arising directly from apex of pseudobulb, green, sometimes blotched with purple, narrowly ovate to narrowly elliptic, plicate, gradually contracted at base into a long petiole-like stalk, glabrous, apex acute. Inflorescence arising directly from apex of pseudobulb, erect, rather long, racemose, with 2 or 3 tubular sheaths below middle, glabrous; rachis subdensely to densely few or many flowered; floral bracts narrowly elliptic to lanceolate, small, apex acute. Flowers resupinate, ascending or pendulous, narrowly tubular; pedicel and ovary usually arcuate, elongate, slender. Sepals and petals subsimilar, free, spreading or not, narrowly elliptic to linear, tapering gradually toward base; lip narrowly oblong-obovate, elongate, 3-lobed above middle, lateral margins involute, base shallowly saccate, not spurred; lateral lobes linear or narrowly oblong; mid-lobe oblong or obovate, with a fleshy callus at base. Column elongate, slightly dilated toward apex, with or without a pair of ventral wings; anther terminal, incumbent; pollinia 4, in 2 pairs, slightly laterally compressed, waxy, attached to a viscidium.

Four species: from Nepal, NE India, and Bhutan, through S and E China, to N Thailand, Vietnam, and Japan; three species (one endemic) in China.