Oberonia cryptantha Schltr., Repert. Spec. Nov. Regni Veg. Beih. 1 (1911) 178
Type: Schlechter 17874 (holo B, lost)
Epiphytic, erect or spreading, up to 14 cm high. Rhizome very short; roots filiform, elongated, flexuose, glabrous. Stems very short, entirely hidden by the leaf-bases. Leaves 4-6, erect or suberect, usually subfalcate-oblique, lanceolate-ligulate, acute, 4.5-9 cm long, at the base 0.7-0.8 cm wide. Inflorescence carrying flowers up to the base, at the base with several bract-like scales, up to 11 cm long, c. 0.08 cm diam. across the flowers, as long as or longer than the leaves. Floral bracts erect-patent, overlapping, lanceolate, acute, glabrous, with irregular margins, much longer than the flowers. Flowers minute, entirely hidden between the bracts. Sepals elliptic, shortly acuminate, glabrous, 0.05 cm long. Lateral sepals oblique. Petals obliquely lanceolate, subobtuse, with irregular margins, subdentate, a little shorter than the sepals. Lip 3-lobed, glabrous, 0.08 cm long, between the apices of the lateral lobes 0.07 cm wide; lateral lobes basal, divergent, broadly trapezoid-quadratic, with irregularly denticulate outer margins; mid-lobe above the narrow base somewhat fan-shaped-quadrangular, almost twice as large as the lateral lobes, at the apex 0.05 cm wide, margins denticulate, apex truncate. Column very short, rather thick, glabrous. Ovary cylindrical, glabrous, including the pedicel 0.08 cm long. (After Schlechter, 1911-1914)
Colours: Flowers pale yellow.
Habitat: Epiphyte in hill forest; 450 m.
Flowering time in the wild: June.
Distribution: Malesia (New Guinea, endemic).
Distribution in New Guinea: Papua New Guinea. See map: 485-78M.JPG.
Cultivation: Warm growing epiphyte.