Last few flowers

The last few flowers of a large Robiquetia spathulata hanging over a stream - just enough of them to make an identification.

The dangling inflorescence, up to 15cm long, may bear more than 50 flowers but they do not open at the same time, and each small flower has a short live of 1 or 2 days only, which is why this plant is not popularly cultured.

Bulbophyllum translucidum - a new species

The aptly named Bulbophyllum translucidum is a very recent addition to the rich flora of Phillippines. The latin epithet translucidum means translucent, which refers to the thin sparkling margin at the edge of the sepals and petals as shown in the first photo below. 

  

We found this specimen in Samar a few years back which eventually flowered under cultivation.  Although already known for a few years, it was only formally described some months back in Die Orchidee V2(4) 2016 . The type specimen was from Mindanao, which is a little bit diffferent from the Samar form.

I took liberty to cut and past some pictures from the paper as follows:

The most noticeable difference are the leaves, which are very thin in the Samar form and more robust in the type specimen. The second is the flower colouration - but these deltas are typically ignored by taxonomists.

Blue Peas vine

A relative of the jadevine but this is blue instead of green - hence the name Strongylodon caerulea.

This a large vine from the Philippines that has not yet found its way to the horticultural scene.

The white Ixora

 It is now the dry season - there was no rain in this forest for 3 months.... yet this Ixora finlaysoniana is in full bloom.

It is found in the more seasonal forest from IndoChina to Thailand and Philippines. Unlike many of its relatives, this species is not commonly in cultivation in the tropics, probably due to its less floriferous nature in the tropical climate.