金塔隔距兰 jin ta ge ju lan

Sarcanthus filiformis Lindley, Edwards’s Bot. Reg. 28 (Misc.): 61. 1842.

Plants pendulous. Stems more than 60 cm, rather slender, 3-4 mm in diam., branched or unbranched, laxly many leaved, internodes 4-6 cm. Leaves terete, to 33 cm × 2-2.5 mm, slender, fleshy, obtuse. Inflorescences 1 or 2, lateral, usually opposite to leaves, shorter than or sometimes nearly as long as leaves, branched or unbranched, densely many flowered; floral bracts narrowly ovate-lanceolate, ca. 2 mm. Flowers opening widely, sepals and petals yellowish green, with purplish brown stripes, lip with white lateral lobes and purple-red mid-lobe, column yellow; pedicel and ovary 4-5 mm, slender. Dorsal sepal ovate-elliptic, cymbiform, ca. 4 × 2 mm, obtuse; lateral sepals suboblong, ca. 4 × 2.5 mm, base adnate to column foot. Petals suboblong, much smaller than sepals, obtuse; lip lateral lobes erect, deltoid, obtuse and incurved, proximal margin inflexed; inflexed part square; mid-lobe sagittate-triangular, ca. 2 mm, with 2 basal backward narrow lobules, adaxially with longitudinal ridges triangularly thickened halfway; spur broadly conic, dorsiventrally compressed, concave, ca. 3 × 2 mm, interior inconspicuously septate, with a back wall callus; callus nearly stellate, triangularly thickened at center, base densely papillate-hairy. Column ca. 2 mm; anther cap elongate and triangular toward apex; stipe ovate-lanceolate, apical margin revolute; viscidium suborbicular, small. Fl. Sep-Oct. 2n = 38.

Epiphytic on tree trunks in broad-leaved evergreen forests; 400-1000 m. SW Guangxi, Hainan, S Yunnan [NE India, Myanmar, Nepal, Thailand, Vietnam].