Genus Claderia

Claderia Hook. f.,
Fl. Brit. Ind. 5 (1890) 810

Sympodial plants with very long rhizomes. Stem relatively short, not fleshy, c. 4-leaved. Leaves sheathing at the base, arranged in two rows, glabrous, plicate, deciduous, convolute, thin-textured. Inflorescence a terminal panicle with very short lateral branches. Flowers appearing one-by-one, medium-sized, resupinate, green with darker veins. Sepals free. Petals free, about as long as the dorsal sepal, but more oblique and spathulate. Lip without spur or with a spur-like sac at he base, not mobile. Column-foot absent. Pollinia 2, cleft, solid, caudicles absent, stipe absent, viscidium present.

Distribution
Southeast Asia, Malaysia, Indonesia (not in Java), Papua New Guinea. Two species; in New Guinea one, endemic, species [Claderia papuana Schltr.].

Habitat
Climbing at the base of trees or creeping over logs in undisturbed lowland forest.

Notes
Highly characteristic plants, rarely if ever seen in cultivation, with short leafy shoots appearing at very large intervals along the rhizome, which may be several metres long. The strange, green, prominently veined flowers are unlike those of any other orchid.

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