e-Key <span id="jodit_selection_marker_1707829441440_4331997591843353" data-jodit_selection_marker="start" style="line-height: 0; display: none;"></span>v3 - Cheiros<span id="jodit_selection_marker_1707829441440_43913337143523035" data-jodit_selection_marker="end" style="line-height: 0; display: none;"></span>tylis
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Interactive keys to the identification of seed plants of southern Africa using keys based on plant morphology.

Orchidaceae - Spiranthoideae - Cranichidae - Cheirostylis Blume

Description:

  • Terrestrial herbs, with creeping rhizomes and ascending or erect, simple, leafy stems
  • Leaves petiolate, ovate or lanceolate, membranous
  • Inflorescence a terminal, lax raceme, pubescent; flowers small, white or brown; bracts small
  • Sepals united in lower half, connivent or spreading, equal or laterals slightly broader
  • Petals adnate to median sepal
  • Lip united with base of gynostemium, base saccate with 2 calli inside, limb entire or divaricately bilobed
  • Gynostemium short, with pair of appendages beneath stigma; anther erect or somewhat incumbent; pollinia 2, sectile, attached to single viscidium
  • Capsule erect, ovoid or oblong
  • x = 13

Nomenclature:

  • Cheirostylis Blume
    • Blume: 413, t. 16 (1825)
    • Stewart et al.: 213 (1982)
    • Linder & Kurzweil: 76 (1999)

Distribution & Notes:

  • Global: Species ± 22, in Old World tropics and subtropics
  • Southern Africa: Species 1: Cheirostylis gymnochiloides (Ridl.) Rchb.f. (previously misidentified as Hetaeria) in KwaZulu-Natal

References:

  • BLUME, C.L. 1825-1826. Bijdragen tot de flora van Nederlandsch Indië. Lands Drukkerij, Batavia
  • LINDER, H.P. & KURZWEIL, H. 1999. Orchids of southern Africa. A.A. Balkema, Rotterdam
  • STEWART, J., LINDER, H.P., SCHELPE, E.A. & HALL, A.V. 1982. Wild orchids of southern Africa. Macmillan, Johannesburg