Orchids of the genus Gastrodia
are found across temperate and tropical Asia, Oceania and Madagascar. They are mycoheterotrophs;
parasitic plants which obtain nutrients and sugars from Mycorrhizal Fungi (Fungi which normally form symbiotic relationships with
plants). They are a diverse group with
over fifty species ranging in size from under five to over 100 cm.
In a paper published in the journal Phytotaxa on 5 August 2014,
Kenji Suetsugu of the Graduate School of Human and Environmental Studies at
Kyoto University describes a new species of Gastrodia
from Takashima Island, off the coast of Kagoshima Prefecture on Kyushu Island,
Japan.
The new species is named Gastrodia flexistyloides,
though no explanation is given for this name. It is a 9-18 cm leafless Orchid,
brown in colour with brown flowers with white spots and a tuberous rhizome
(i.e. a tuberous root that can persist below ground outside the growing season
and regrow into a new plant when conditions are favourable). The flowers do not
open, the plant apparently reproducing entirely by self-fertilisation. Flowers
are produced in mid-March to early April, seeds are contained within fruit
produced from early April to early May. Gastrodia flexistyloides
was found living in Bamboo forests.
Flowering plant of Gastrodia flexistyloides.
Scale bar is 2 cm. Suetsugu (2014).
See also…
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