Dendrobium Sw.
V. Dendrobium section Dendrobium Lindley 1844
Features:
Roots glabrous.
Stems or pseudobulbs usually cane-like, fleshy or rarely wiry, usually many-leaved, branching or not, less often with distinct, ovoid to fusiform, one- to few-leaved pseudobulbs.
Leaves usually short-lived, with or without a tubular sheath at the base.
Inflorescences usually short, pendulous when elongate, one- to many-flowered, appearing laterally or apically from leafy or leafless stems, most often from the leafless stem of the previous year.
Flowers often showy; mentum short, chin-like or less often narrowly conical.
Labellum usually rigidly attached to apex of column foot, not adnate to it, entire or weakly lobed, adaxially often darker coloured in the centre, often densely and finely pubescent, often with finely fringed margins often with a linear, basal claw, without multiple keels but sometimes with a single callus or with a single longitudinal keel.
This section is represented by 3 species in Sindhudurg district
Dendrobium crepidatum Lindl. & Paxton
In Paxton's Fl. Gard. 1: 63 (1850);
Callista crepidata (Lindl. & Paxton) Kuntze in Revis. Gen. Pl. 2: 654 (1891)
Dendrobium actinomorphum Blatt. & Hallb. in J. Indian Bot. 2: 50 (1921)
Dendrobium maguanense Q.Xu & Z.J.Liu in Phytotaxa 286: 50 (2016)
Pendulous epiphytes.
Ecology Epiphytic orchid found growing on Terminalia paniculata, Careya arborea in semi evergreen forest
This specimen id observed at Chowkul
Pseudobulbs greenish yellow, 8-20 cm long, narrow at the base, thickening upwards, about 0.6-2 cm thick; inter nodes about 2 cm long, longitudinally striated, the nodes somewhat thickened.
Leaves 4-11 X 0.5-1.5 cm, membranous, sheathing, oblong lanceolate, acute, entire, glabrous, many-nerved.
Flowers 3cm across, pink yellow spot on labellum, in pairs from the nodes of the apical parts of the pseudobulbs, pink, pedicellate, bracteate, Pedicel with ovary 23-28 mm long, straight or slightly
Bracts minute, dry, scarious. curved.
Sepals about 15 x 6-7 mm, oblong, obutse or mucro nulate, fleshy, entire, 5-nerved; mentum 2-4 cm long, shortly quadrate-rounded.
Petals 15 X 7 mm, broadly oblong, spreading, wavy, abruptly tapered at the very base, obtuse. 5-n~rved.
Lip 11 X 11-13 mm; hardly lobed, oblong-orbicular in outline, with a narrow, 3-4 mm Iong claw; basal portion erect, more or less connivent around the column, forming a hollow at the base; apical half spreading, wavy-or slightly crimped, puberulous, rounded or shallowly emarginate at the apex, deep yellow base.
Column 3-4 mm long, oblong with curved foot about 4 mm long.
Anther conical-oblong. stigma ovate
Flowering: April
Fruiting: May onwards