Dendrobium

Dendrobium is a huge genus of orchids. It was established by Olof Swartz in 1799 and today contains about 1,200 species. The genus occurs in diverse habitats throughout much of south, east and southeast Asia, including the Philippines, Borneo, Australia, New Guinea, Solomon Islands and New Zealand. The name is from the Greek dendron ("tree") and bios ("life"); it means "one who lives on trees", or, essentially, "epiphyte".
In 1981, Briegar reclassified all terete-leaved Dendrobiums from Australia and New Guinea into a new genus, Dockrillia. The Winika orchid from New Zealand was formerly D. cunninghamii, but has now been moved into a monotypic genus Winika. In 1989, Clements upgraded the D. speciosum complex into individual species;[1] similarly, the D. bigibbum complex (which contains the well-known Cooktown Orchid of Australia, D. phalaenopsis) has recently been split up.

Selected species

The Cooktown Orchid was figured on Australian stamps in 1968 and 1998, and several Dendrobium cultivars are depicted on the obverse side of the Singapore Orchid Series currency notes issued between 1967 and 1976:
  • Dendrobium Marjorie Ho – S$10 [1]
  • Dendrobium Shangri-La – S$500 [2]
  • Dendrobium Kimiyo Kondo – S$1000 [3]
The Golden-bow Dendrobium (D. chrysotoxum), colloquially called "Fried-egg Orchid" was one of the species grown by the fictional private detective and orchid fancier Nero Wolfe, and plays a role in The Final Deduction.

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