ANGRAECUM PLATYCORNU Orchidaceae

摘要

The history, taxonomy, pollination and cultivation of Angraecum platycornu Hermans, P.J. Cribb & J. Bosser, an interesting new species from Madagascar is discussed. A description is provided.Angraecum platycornu is one of the most unusual new orchid species to be found on the Indian Ocean Island of Madagascar in recent times. It was first collected in 1994 by Kate Lance whilst undertaking a tropical forest mapping project on the Masoala peninsula in the northeast of the island. Masoala is the largest surviving continuous block of rain forest on this now degraded island. Expeditions by the Missouri Botanical Garden and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and others have yielded a great insight inthis unique habitat and recorded a number of new species both of flora and fauna. The Angraecum was identified as new during routine work on unidentified dried material and specimens in spirit of orchids deposited in the Kew Herbarium. During the same period cultivated plants of the same unusual species were recognised in orchid nurseries in Madagascar; these plants were said to have originally come from the central region of the Island and then propagated by division. The new plant was finally described and illustrated in The Orchid Review in 2002 (Hermans etal, 2002). The name refers to the unusually broad and curved spur of the species.