Plate 122.
Reading edition
ANSELLIA GIGANTEA. Transvaal, Natal, Portuguese East Africa.
Orchidaceae. Tribe Vandeae. Ansellia, Lindl.; Benth. et Hook. f. Gen. Plant. vol. iii. p. 537.
Ansellia gigantea, Reichb. f. in Linnaea, vol. xx. p. 673; Fl. Cap. vol. v. sect. 3, p. 62.
This epiphytic orchid belongs to a tropical African genus of about 6 species, and is the only representative which occurs in South Africa. The flowers are a pale lemon colour, sometimes barred or blotched with brown. Specimens were sent to England from Natal prior to 1857, and might be considered, as was suggested by Hooker and the late Dr. Bolus, a colour variety of the tropical African Ansellia africana. Mr. Rolfe in the Flora Capensis considers it to be a distinct species, as described by Reichenbach, and we have followed his naming. The figure given by Bolus (Ic. Orch. Austro-Afric. 11. t. 29) represents a colour form different from that reproduced here.
The plant is found in the mountainous parts of the eastern Transvaal, on the coast of Natal, and near Delagoa Bay. Our figure was prepared from a specimen which flowered at the Division of Botany in June 1922, and which was collected by Mrs. Sinclair Allen on the Lebombo Mountains in Swaziland.
Description:—Stems elongate, terete or somewhat sulcate, 1/3-1 ft. long, with 6 to many leaves on the upper part or near the apex and numerous imbricate membranous sheaths below. Leaves distichous, linear-oblong to elliptic-lanceolate, subacute, ¼-1 ft. long, ½-1½ in. broad, with 3-5 prominent veins. Panicle terminal, ½-1 ft. long, usually with several branches, rarely reduced to a simple raceme, with a few short sheaths below. Bracts triangular-ovate, subacute, 1/6 in. long. Pedicels slender, 1-1¼ in. long. Flowers medium-sized, light yellow, more or less barred or blotched with light dusky brown; sepals and petals spreading, oblong or elliptic-oblong, obtuse, about ¾ in. long; lip 3-lobed, rather shorter than the sepals; side lobes erect, oblong, obtuse; front lobe recurved, elliptic-oblong, obtuse or emarginate; disc with 3 prominent crenulate keels; column clavate, 1/3 in. long (National Herb. Pretoria 2601).
Plate 122.—Figs. 1, 2, front and side view of flower; Fig. 3, lip; Fig. 4, column; Fig. 5, pollinia.
F.P.S.A., 1924.
