''Cheirostylis'', commonly known as fleshy jewel orchids or velvet orchids, is a

genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...

of about sixty species of

flowering plant Flowering plants are plants that bear flowers and fruits, and form the clade Angiospermae (). The term angiosperm is derived from the Ancient Greek, Greek words (; 'container, vessel') and (; 'seed'), meaning that the seeds are enclosed with ...

s in the orchid

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

Orchidaceae Orchids are plants that belong to the family (biology), family Orchidaceae (), a diverse and widespread group of flowering plants with blooms that are often colourful and fragrant. Orchids are cosmopolitan distribution, cosmopolitan plants that ...

. Plants in this genus are

terrestrial Terrestrial refers to things related to land or the planet Earth, as opposed to extraterrestrial. Terrestrial may also refer to: * Terrestrial animal, an animal that lives on land opposed to living in water, or sometimes an animal that lives on o ...

herbs Herbs are a widely distributed and widespread group of plants, excluding vegetables, with savory or aromatic properties that are used for flavoring and garnish (food), garnishing food, for medicinal purposes, or for fragrances. Culinary use typi ...

with a

caterpillar Caterpillars ( ) are the larval stage of members of the order Lepidoptera (the insect order comprising butterflies and moths). As with most common names, the application of the word is arbitrary, since the larvae of sawflies (suborder ...

-like

rhizome In botany and dendrology, a rhizome ( ) is a modified subterranean plant stem that sends out roots and Shoot (botany), shoots from its Node (botany), nodes. Rhizomes are also called creeping rootstalks or just rootstalks. Rhizomes develop from ...

and a loose

rosette Rosette is the French diminutive of ''rose''. It may refer to: Flower shaped designs * Rosette (award), a mark awarded by an organisation * Rosette (design), a small flower design *hence, various flower-shaped or rotational symmetric forms: ** R ...

of leaves. Small, white, hairy flowers develop as the leaves wither. They are found in tropical

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

, southern

Asia Asia ( , ) is the largest continent in the world by both land area and population. It covers an area of more than 44 million square kilometres, about 30% of Earth's total land area and 8% of Earth's total surface area. The continent, which ...

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, southeastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of China, east of the Indian subcontinent, and northwest of the Mainland Au ...

Malesia Malesia is a biogeographical region straddling the Equator and the boundaries of the Indomalayan and Australasian realms. It is a phytogeographical floristic region in the Paleotropical kingdom. It was first recognized as a distinct region ...

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; , fossilized , also known as Papua or historically ) is the List of islands by area, world's second-largest island, with an area of . Located in Melanesia in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is ...

and

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

Description

Orchids in the genus ''Cheirostylis'' are terrestrial,

perennial In horticulture, the term perennial ('' per-'' + '' -ennial'', "through the year") is used to differentiate a plant from shorter-lived annuals and biennials. It has thus been defined as a plant that lives more than 2 years. The term is also ...

deciduous In the fields of horticulture and botany, the term deciduous () means "falling off at maturity" and "tending to fall off", in reference to trees and shrubs that seasonally shed Leaf, leaves, usually in the autumn; to the shedding of petals, aft ...

sympodial In botany, sympodial growth is a bifurcating branching pattern where one branch develops more strongly than the other, resulting in the stronger branches forming the primary shoot and the weaker branches appearing laterally. A sympodium, als ...

herbs with a creeping, caterpillar-like, above-ground

anchored to the ground by fine white root hairs. The leaves are thinly textured and arranged in a loose rosette with a short

petiole Petiole may refer to: *Petiole (botany), the stalk of a leaf, attaching the blade to the stem *Petiole (insect anatomy) In entomology, petiole is the technical term for the narrow waist of some hymenopteran insects, especially ants, bees, and ...

but are usually withered by flowering time. The flowers are

resupinate Resupination is derived from the Latin word ''resupinus'', meaning "bent back with the face upward" or "on the back". "Resupination" is the noun form of the adjective "resupine" which means "being upside-down, supine or facing upward". The word " ...

and usually small, white and hairy with the

dorsal Dorsal (from Latin ''dorsum'' ‘back’) may refer to: * Dorsal (anatomy), an anatomical term of location referring to the back or upper side of an organism or parts of an organism * Dorsal, positioned on top of an aircraft's fuselage The fus ...

sepal A sepal () is a part of the flower of angiosperms (flowering plants). Usually green, sepals typically function as protection for the flower in bud, and often as support for the petals when in bloom., p. 106 Etymology The term ''sepalum'' ...

and

lateral Lateral is a geometric term of location which may also refer to: Biology and healthcare * Lateral (anatomy), a term of location meaning "towards the side" * Lateral cricoarytenoid muscle, an intrinsic muscle of the larynx * Lateral release ( ...

sepals fused for about half their length. The

petal Petals are modified leaves that form an inner whorl surrounding the reproductive parts of flowers. They are often brightly coloured or unusually shaped to attract pollinators. All of the petals of a flower are collectively known as the ''corol ...

s are free from each other but are narrower than the sepals. The tip of the labellum has two lobes and a narrow base forming a shallow depression containing two calli.

Taxonomy and naming

The genus ''Cheirostylis'' was first formally described in 1825 by

Carl Ludwig Blume Charles Ludwig de Blume or Karl Ludwig von Blume (9 June 1796 – 3 February 1862) was a German-Dutch botanist and entomologist who spent most of his professional life in the Netherlands and the Dutch East Indies. As deputy director of agricul ...

and the description was published in ''Bijdragen tot de flora van Nederlandsch Indië''. The first species of ''Cheirostylis'' described by Blume was '' C. montana'', making it the

type species In International_Code_of_Zoological_Nomenclature, zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the spe ...

Distribution

''Cheirostylis'' orchids occur in tropical Africa through tropical Asia from

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

to New Guinea and some

Pacific Islands The Pacific islands are a group of islands in the Pacific Ocean. They are further categorized into three major island groups: Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Depending on the context, the term ''Pacific Islands'' may refer to one of several ...

. Seventeen species, eight of which are

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

occur in

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

and two species are endemic to Australia.

List of species

The following is a list of species recognised by the

Plants of the World Online Plants of the World Online (POWO) is an online taxonomic database published by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. History Following the Convention on Biological Diversity, the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew launched Plants of the World Online i ...

as at November 2023: * '' Cheirostylis acuminata'' Blume * '' Cheirostylis barbata'' Q.Liu & X.F.Wu * '' Cheirostylis bidentata'' J.J.Sm. * '' Cheirostylis bipunctata'' Aver. * '' Cheirostylis boryi'' (Rchb.f.) Hermans & P.J.Cribb * '' Cheirostylis calcarata'' X.H.Jin & S.C.Chen * '' Cheirostylis celebensis'' P.O'Byrne & J.J.Verm. * '' Cheirostylis chinensis'' Rolfe * '' Cheirostylis chuxiongensis'' J.D.Ya * '' Cheirostylis clibborndyeri'' S.Y.Hu & Baretto * '' Cheirostylis cochinchinensis'' Blume * '' Cheirostylis cristata'' Aver. * '' Cheirostylis dendrophila'' Schltr. * '' Cheirostylis divina'' (Guinea) Summerh. * '' Cheirostylis filipetala'' Aver. * '' Cheirostylis flabellata'' (A.Rich.) Wight * '' Cheirostylis foliosa'' Aver. * '' Cheirostylis glandulifera'' Aver. * '' Cheirostylis glandulosa'' (Aver.) J.M.H.Shaw * '' Cheirostylis goldschmidtiana'' Schltr. * '' Cheirostylis grandiflora'' Blume * '' Cheirostylis griffithii'' Lindl. * '' Cheirostylis gunnarii'' A.N.Rao * '' Cheirostylis gymnochiloides'' (Ridl.) Rchb.f. * '' Cheirostylis jamesleungii'' S.Y.Hu & Barretto * '' Cheirostylis javanica'' J.J.Sm. * '' Cheirostylis kabaenae'' Ormerod * '' Cheirostylis latipetala'' Aver. & Averyanova * '' Cheirostylis lepida'' (Rchb.f.) Rolfe * '' Cheirostylis liukiuensis'' Masam. * '' Cheirostylis malipoensis'' X.H.Jin & S.C.Chen * '' Cheirostylis marmorifolia'' Aver. * ''

Cheirostylis merrillii ''Cheirostylis'', commonly known as fleshy jewel orchids or velvet orchids, is a genus of about sixty species of flowering plants in the orchid family Orchidaceae. Plants in this genus are terrestrial herbs with a caterpillar-like rhizome and a ...

'' (Ames & Quisumb.) Ormerod * '' Cheirostylis moniliformis'' (Griff.) Seidenf. * ''

Cheirostylis montana ''Cheirostylis'', commonly known as fleshy jewel orchids or velvet orchids, is a genus of about sixty species of flowering plants in the orchid family Orchidaceae. Plants in this genus are terrestrial herbs with a caterpillar-like rhizome and a ...

'' Blume * '' Cheirostylis monteiroi'' S.Y.Hu & Barretto * '' Cheirostylis nantouensis'' T.P.Lin * '' Cheirostylis notialis'' D.L.Jones – southern fleshy jewel orchid * '' Cheirostylis nuda'' (Thouars) Ormerod * '' Cheirostylis octodactyla'' Ames * '' Cheirostylis orobanchoides'' (F.Muell.) D.L.Jones & M.A.Clem. * '' Cheirostylis ovata'' (F.M.Bailey) Schltr. – banded fleshy jewel orchid * '' Cheirostylis parvifolia'' Lindl. * '' Cheirostylis pingbianensis'' K.Y.Lang * '' Cheirostylis pubescens'' E.C.Parish & Rchb.f. * '' Cheirostylis pusilla'' Lindl. * '' Cheirostylis raymundii'' Schltr. * '' Cheirostylis serpens'' Aver. * '' Cheirostylis sessanica'' A.N.Rao * '' Cheirostylis sherriffii'' N.Pearce & P.J.Cribb * '' Cheirostylis spathulata'' J.J.Sm. * '' Cheirostylis tabiyahanensis'' (Hayata) N.Pearce & P.J.Cribb * '' Cheirostylis takeoi'' (Hayata) Schltr. * '' Cheirostylis thailandica'' Seidenf. * '' Cheirostylis thanmoiensis'' (Gagnep.) Ormerod * '' Cheirostylis tippica'' A.N.Rao * '' Cheirostylis tortilacinia'' C.S.Leou * '' Cheirostylis wenshanensis'' J.B.Chen, L.J.Chen & W.H.Rao * '' Cheirostylis yei'' J.D.Ya, Z.D.Han & H.Jiang * '' Cheirostylis yunnanensis'' Rolfe

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q134018 Cranichideae genera