e-Key v3 - Brownleea
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Interactive keys to the identification of seed plants of southern Africa using keys based on plant morphology.

Orchidaceae - Orchidoideae - Diseae - Brownleea Harv. ex Lindl.

Description :

  • Terrestrial herbs up to 0.6 m tall, with simple, ovoid root tubers
  • Leaves 1-3(-5), cauline, lanceolate to ovate, ± plicate
  • Inflorescence a capitate to elongate, dense or lax spike, rarely 1-flowered; flowers white to mauve
  • Sepals : median one galeate and spurred, adnate to petals; laterals spreading
  • Petals mostly oblong, sometimes with anticous lobe, basally fused to gynostemium
  • Lip narrow, often linear, with wide base fused to gynostemium, minute, entire
  • Gynostemium : anther erect or reflexed, with 2 parallel and adjacent thecae, auricles large; pollinia 2, sectile, attached by short caudicles to separate viscidia; stigma sessile at base of gynostemium; rostellum tall, 3-lobed
  • Capsule cylindrical or oblong, ribbed

Nomenclature:

  • Brownleea Harv. ex Lindl.
    • Lindley: 16 (1842)
    • Rolfe: 259 (1913)
    • Schelpe: 96 (1966)
    • Linder: 13 (1981)
    • Stewart et al.: 154 (1982)
    • Linder & Kurzweil: 289 (1999)

Distribution & Notes:

  • Global : Species 7, Africa and Madagascar
  • Southern Africa : Species 5 in eastern half from Northern Province, Mpumalanga, Free State, KwaZulu-Natal, Lesotho, Eastern Cape to Knysna (Western Cape)

References:

  • LINDER, H.P. 1981. Taxonomic studies on the Disinae . A revision of the genus Brownleea Lindl. Journal of South African Botany 47
  • LINDER, H.P. & KURZWEIL, H. 1999. Orchids of southern Africa . A.A. Balkema, Rotterdam
  • LINDLEY, J. 1842. Notes upon Cape Orchidaceae . Hooker's London Journal of Botany 1
  • ROLFE, R.A. 1913. Order CXXXI. Orchideae . Flora capensis 5,3
  • SCHELPE, E.A. 1966. An introduction to the South African Orchids . Purnell & Sons, Cape Town, Johannesburg
  • STEWART, J., LINDER, H.P., SCHELPE, E.A. & HALL, A.V. 1982. Wild orchids of southern Africa . Macmillan, Johannesburg