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#Orchid-Secrets

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Submitted: January 25, 2008
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Birdiesby *Althytrion

Photography / Animals, Plants & Nature / Flowers, Trees & Plants

Ornithocephalus, bird head, is the name of this orchid, and the flowers really resemble little birds with tiny heads and long beaks. Their size is only about 1/5" = 5 mm.

I turned this picture upside down. In fact, the iris-like foliage of this epiphytic plant is growing downwards and the flowers are non-resupinate.

Edit: resupination: the "lips" of the nearly all orchid flowers we find in garden centers or at exhibitions are at a 6 o'clock position. This is what we humans consider to be the "normal" way but in fact these flowers are rotated by an angle of 180° - they are resupinate! Originally, the lip is at the 12 o'clock position and moves to 6 o'clock during the development of the flower bud. Only for some species, the position of the lip remains unchanged.

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~lumizet Oct 25, 2010

Awesome gallery at all!

*Althytrion Nov 9, 2010

Thank you very much!

~keshae Jan 27, 2008

Beautifully fragile! Thanks for sharing all these beautiful plants. I haven't had a chance to appreciate so much beauty in nature

*Althytrion Jan 28, 2008

Thank you very much, Vivienne! I agree - it needs a long time to see all those beautiful things in nature - but you can find a lot of them when you're visiting a good botanical garden (tho in this special case I really appreciate that this orchid is a plant of my own!)