LECANORCHIS TAIWANIANA

May 13, 2019

An Assam forest officer’s chance discovery of Lecanorchis taiwaniana has given India one of its smallest orchids in terms of size and duration of bloom to be recorded botanically. The discovery has been published in the Japanese Journal of Botany.

About:

Discovery: It has been discovered by an Assamese forest officer Jatindra Sarma in Assam. The orchid was discovered earlier in Japan, Taiwan, and Laos.
Features:
- It is a variant of a Japanese orchid.
- Lecanorchis taiwaniana is a mycoheterotroph, one of two types of parasitic plants that have abandoned photosynthesis.
- It is India’s one of the smallest orchids in terms of size and duration of bloom to be recorded botanically.
Significance: Lecanorchis taiwaniana adds to the orchid wealth of northeast India, which has 800 of some 1,300 species in the country. About 300 species are found in the Western Ghats and 200 in the northwestern Himalayas.