298. ODONTOGLOSSUM HARRYANUM Orchidaceae

Sarah Thomas

Summary . The history, taxonomy, distribution, habitat and cultivation of the Colombian Odontoghsum havyanum (Orchidaceae) are discussed and a full botanical description of the species is provided.

The story of Odontoglossum hanyanum Rchb.f. was told first by Frederick Boyle in The Woodlands Orchids (1901) and has since been related by J.A. Fowlie in 73.e Orchid Digest (1973). It is retold here because it is hard to resist a story linking orchids with greed, fulfilled prophesies and black magic charms.

The tale begins in 1876, with a prediction made by the celebrated plant collector Benedict Roezl(l823-1885). On returning from the Antioquia region of Colombia, Roezl announced to his employer, the orchid nurseryman and self-styled ‘Orchid King’, Frederick Sander, that a new Odontoglossum was awaiting discovery there. He went on to predict that this new species would have darker and more striking tints than any yet known. When asked the grounds for his opinion he could only say that he ‘smelt it’.

A decade later, H.G. Reichenbach received several plants from the region obtained by the firm of Messrs Veitch & Sons, one of Sander’s competitors. Reichenbach described this astounding new orchid as Odontoglossum harvanum, dedicating it to Harry Veitch. The plants had been imported originally by Messrs Horseman of Colchester from Senor Rodriguez Pantocha. In the Victorian era it was usual for nurserymen to conceal the origin of their plants so they could not be procured by competing establishments. However, Frederick Sander learned by accident that his competitor’s plants had been shipped from the Port of Baranquilla, Colombia, so must have originated from the Antioquia district. Roezl’s prophesy flashed to mind, and Sander immediately telegrammed Mr Ker- bach, a collector based in Colombia, to go and find this Odontoglos- sum. Kerbach made inquiries in the local town where a bank clerk reported that a recent customer was ‘swearing like a wild Indian at orchids and everybody connected with them’. This customer turned out to be a powerful landowner called Don Filipe. Don Filipe was frustrated by dealings with a young French orchid collector, with whom he had arranged to send a shipment of orchids to Europe via a friend in Baranquilla. The young Frenchman had subsequently

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Odontoglossum harry anum

Plate 298

ANN FARRER

drowned and Don Filipe had received no payment for his troubles. Kerbach, suspecting that he had found the source of the

Odontoglossurn, proceeded to Don Filipe’s hacienda. The value of orchids was well known in this area of South America and collectors had to negotiate a lease with the landowner in order to fell trees and collect the orchids. Kerbach would have been unable to collect sufficient plants to be worth shipping if he were unable to cut down trees. Kerbach failed in his attempt to negotiate a lease with Don FJipe, only managing to enrage the landowner with his persistence, to such an extent that the latter vowed to shoot anyone found collecting orchids on his estate. In despair, Kerbach sought the help of a local village priest and his sacristan. O n hearing Kerbach’s problems the priest declared ‘if the saints won’t hear you, take your prayer to the devil’. He was willing to help Kerbach to find the devil for a fee of 20 dollars and all incidental expenses. The devil was enlisted via the sacristan who asked for a dollar for the Indian who would work a charm and a dollar for himself to pay for the masses which would expiate his sin. He instructed Kerbach to write a letter to Don Filipe’s wife begging her to intercede in the matter. A spell was cast on the document by the Indian so that, if the landowner still refused to allow orchids to be gathered on his estate, a dreadful curse would befall him. Two days after his wife received the letter, Don Filipe was willing to negotiate the lease. Kerbach was never sure if it was the fear of the curse, or the gentle persuasion of his wife that had made Don Filipe change his mind; either way, Odontoglossum hayanurn was found in Antioquia, fulfilling Roezl’s prophecy.

The destructive methods of the Victorian orchid collector meant that the plants in the type locality were soon exhausted. Kerbach Shipped every specimen he could find to Europe, where they survived only a few years in cultivation. The species remained lost for nearly a century until the early 1960s when Gilbert0 Escobar, a member of the Colombian Orchid Society, received a visit from an old friend, Ana Fonnegra de Isaza, who handed him a freshly cut inflorescence of what proved to be the long-lost 0. havanurn. The species is now well established in cultivation.

This very fine species has large (up to 8 cm tall) pseudobulbs which become furrowed with age, producing leathery leaves to 30 cm long and inflorescences which have been known to reach 80 cm in length and bear as many as fifteen flowers. The flowers themselves are fragrant and waxy, opening to a diameter of up to 12 cm and can

vary in colour from almost uniformly blackish-brown to very strongly green-banded. The large undulate lip is white at first but matures to yellow, and is heavily streaked with reddish-purple.

The most closely related species is 0. wjattianum Wilson from Ecuador and Peru. Fowlie (1973) distinguished it from 0. harvanum by its spreading petals, an entire lip, the dentate, erect clinandrium and larger, dentate column wings; and also because of its colour, the tepals being bronze-brown and spotted only at the base, the white callus and the column spotted with yellow-red. However, the differences may not prove sufficiently disjunct to justifi recognition of 0. wyattianum at specific rank and further study is required. Other close relatives are believed to be Oncidium trilobum Schltr. and Oncidium hastilabium Lindl.

CULTIVATION. Odontoglossum haryanum grows well with summer day temperatures of 21-25'C and night temperatures of 12°C; in winter, these should be around 18OC and 15'C respectively. It benefits from 60-70°% shade, or about 2000-2500 candle feet oflight, and requires a balanced fertilizer at 500 ppm. When it is in bloom the pseudobulbs will shrivel away to nothing if kept on a regular water schedule, so it is recommended watering twice as often when in bloom; the potting medium should be coarse.

The species has been widely used in hybridization with many other odontoglossums, and also intergenerically.

Odontoglossum harryanurn Rchb.f. in Gard. Chron, ser. 2, 26: 487 (1886). Type: cult. Messrs Veitch (W-Reichenbach, K).

DESCRIPTION. (Based on Bockemuhl, 1989) Epiphytic herb. Pseudobulbs closely aggregated, oblong-ovate, acuminate, compressed, ancipitous, older ones with longitudinal furrows, usually with one leaf (sometimes bifoliate), up to 8 X 3.5 cm. Leaves lanceolate, acuminate, up to 30 X 4 cm. Znjorescence developing from the axil of the uppermost sheath leac peduncle about 15-20 cm long, with two to three cauline sheath leaves; scape racemose with 6-8 (rarely -1 5) flowers; bracts 1.5 cm; pedicellate ovary 3 cm long. Flowers fleshy, fragrant, 9 cm in diameter; sepals yellow-green, densely spotted chestnut brown, only the apex and a few transverse bands free of marking; petals similar but basal parts with more oblong carmine- red spots; lip white, later turning yellowish, basal lobes slightly, and mid- lobe intensely, striated and banded carmine-red; callus and surrounding area lemon yellow, distal lobe white, unspotted; column greenish at the base, becoming yellow toward the apex. Dorsal sepal broad at the base, elliptic, acuminate, 45 X 20 mm, margin undulate, apex reflexed. Lateral sepals similar in form and size, lateral margins usually turned backwards.

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1

E

Odontoglossnm harryanum. A, dorsal sepal, x 1.5; B, lateral sepal, x 1.5; c, petal, X 1.5; D, lip, x 1.5; E, column and lip, side view, x 1.5; F, callus, x 4.5; G , anther-cap, X 4.5; H, pollinin, side view, x 4.5; I, pollinia, front view, x 4.5. Drawn by Sarah Thomas.

petal 4.0 x 16 mm, extended toward the front with the apices again curved outward, margins undulate. L$ with a wedge-shaped claw 6 x 6 mm with erect basal lobes 5 x 2 mm, grasping the column base; mid-lobe expanded, pandurate, concave in the median part with an undulate margin, distal part undulate on the margin, curved down and terminated in an apicule; entire blade 40 mm long, greatest width 33 mm; callus a three-fold swelling, continued as 3-4 pairs of thread-like fimbriate lamellae and a median lamella with fewer divisions. Column slender with a broader base, 15 mm long, with two geniculately-curved flanks beneath the stigma, pentagonal

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at point of adnation with the basal part of the lip; column wings developed as a continuation of the crenate clinandrium margin, erect, deltoid, continued as a narrow lip around the stigmatic cavity. Anther with elongate beak, papillate at the apex. Rostellum elephant-trunked, somewhat curved downward, without a pouch.

DISTRIBUTION. Colombia (Antioquia). HABITAT. Epiphyte in isolated tree-tops on the margins oflower montane

forest, 1800-2600 m.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. I would like to thank D r Mark Chase of Kew for his comments on the status of 0. harryanum. Thanks also go to Robert Culver of Madison Heights Orchids for cultivation advice.

REFERENCES

Bockemiihl, L. (1 989). Odontoglossurn, a Monograph and Zconograph.

Boyle, P. (1901). The Woodlands Orchids. Macmillan and Co., London. Fowlie, J.A. (1 973). The Discovery and Rediscovery of Odontoglossum

Brucke-Verlag Kurt Schmersow, Hildesheim.

harryanum. OrchidDigest 37,6: 223.

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