Chrysoglossum Blume,
Bijdr. (1825) 337
Sympodial terrestrial plants with short to rather long rhizomes. Pseudobulbs consisting of one internode, rather slender, one-leaved. Leaves not sheathing at the base, glabrous, plicate, not deciduous, convolute, thin-textured. Inflorescence a tall, few- to many-flowered raceme arising on a specialised leafless shoot. Flowers medium-sized. Sepals free. Petals free, about as long as the sepals but somewhat broader. Lip without spur (but the column-foot is provided with a spur!), 3-lobed, with conspicuous crests, margins at the base strongly pleated; mobile. Column with two lateral wings at or below the middle, and with two parallel crests below these wings; column-foot present, provided with a short spur. Pollinia 2, solid, caudicles, stipe, and viscidium absent.
Distribution
Tropical Asia, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Papua New Guinea, east to Samoa. Four species; in New Guinea one, non-endemic, species [Chrysoglossum ornatum Blume].
Habitat
Terrestrial in montane forest.
Notes
Similar in habit to Tainia, Collabium, etc., distinguished by the lip being mobile and having strongly pleated margins at the base. The complex column is also distinctive. Although the flowers are rather attractive, Chrysoglossum is very rare in cultivation.