Overview
Orchidales is a of an order of flowering plants. In taxonomical systems, this is a relatively recent name, as early systems used descriptive botanical names for the order containing the orchids. The Bentham & Hooker and the Engler systems had the orchids in order Microspermae while the Wettstein system treats them as order Gynandrae. Circumscription of the order will vary with the taxonomic system being used. Although mostly the order will consist of the orchids only (usually in one family only, but sometimes divided into more families, as in the Dahlgren system, see below), sometimes other families are added:
Circumscription in the Takhtajan System
Takhtajan system:
- order Orchidales
Circumscription in the Cronquist System
Cronquist system (1981):
- order Orchidales
- family Geosiridaceae
- family Burmanniaceae
- family Corsiaceae
- family Orchidaceae
Circumscription in the Dahlgren System
Dahlgren system:
- order Orchidales
- family Neuwiediaceae
- family Apostasiaceae
- family Cypripediaceae
- family Orchidaceae
Circumscription in the Thorne System
Thorne system (1992):
- order Orchidales
- family Orchidaceae
Apg System
The order is not recognized in the APG II system, which assigns the orchids to order Asparagales.
Photos
Taxonomy
The Order Orchidales is further organized into finer groupings including:
- Family (1): Orchidaceae
- Species: ZipcodeZoo has pages for 47,432 species, subspecies, varieties, forms, and cultivars in the Order Orchidales.
Families
Orchidaceae
Herbs or rarely vines, perennial, rarely annual, strongly mycotrophic, epiphytic, terrestrial, lithophytic, or rarely aquatic or subterranean, usually green and photosynthetic, some without chlorophyll and saprophytic. Roots subterranean or aerial, tuberoid or stolonoid, usually with spongy, multilayered velamen. Stems erect or pendent or modified into creeping rhizomes, simple or sympodially or monopodially branched, delicate to stout, or thickened as corms or pseudobulbs, or greatly reduced, sometimes proliferous (especially diverse in sympodial orchids) . Leaves solitary, several, or reduced to scales, basal or cauline, alternate, distichous, or sometimes opposite or whorled, either convolute or duplicate, simple, sessile or petiolate; stipules absent; blade articulate or not, plicate or conduplicate, cylindric, triangular, or laterally flattened, margins entire. Inflorescences terminal or lateral, racemes, spikes, panicles, or rarely cymose, erect or variously pendent, 1 many-flowered, lax or dense, flowering successively or simultaneously. Flowers bisexual [rarely unisexual], epigynous, resupinate or not, pedicellate or sessile, 3-merous, usually bilaterally symmetric [rarely nearly radially symmetric], with abscission layer between pedicel and peduncle, rarely between ovary and perianth or ovary and pedicel; perianth of 6 tepals in 2 whorls, all petaloid or sepals sometimes greener and more foliaceous in texture; sepals alike or not, lateral sepals often connate (forming synsepal), or all 3 sepals variously connate and/or adnate or distinct and/or free; petals 3, median petal modified as lip, commonly larger or differing in form and color, lateral petals commonly but not always similar to sepals; nectaries of various sorts; extrafloral nectaries sometimes present on pedicels, bracts, or leaf sheaths; stamens usually 1 2( 3, if 3 the 3d modified into sterile staminode), all on side opposite lip, fully or partially adnate to style, forming column; pollen grains in monads or tetrads, usually in 2 8 pollinia, sometimes subdivided into small packets, rarely granular, sometimes pollinia with caudicles and/or stipes; gynoecium 3-carpellate, connate, forming compound, inferior, 1- or 3-locular ovary; style variously adnate to filaments; stigmas usually 3-lobed, concave to convex, part of median stigma lobe modified into rostellum, often separating anther from fertile portions of stigma, commonly preventing or in some cases facilitating self-pollination; ovules numerous, anatropous, minute. Fruits capsules, opening (dehiscing) by longitudinal slits, rarely fleshy and indehiscent berries. Seeds numerous (millions in some species), minute; endosperm absent.[1] [more]
At least 46,384 species and subspecies belong to the Family Orchidaceae.
More info about the Family Orchidaceae may be found here.
Bibliography
- Bentley, S. L. Native Orchids of the Southern Appalachian Mountains. Chapel Hill.
- Brown, P. M. 2002. Wild Orchids of Florida. Gainesville.
- Brown, P. M. 1997. Wild Orchids of the Northeastern United States: A Field Guide. Ithaca, N.Y.
- Brown, P. M. 2000. The Florida Native Orchid Project. Palmetto 20: 610.
- Burns-Balogh, P. and V. A. Funk. 1986. A phylogenetic analysis of the Orchidaceae. Smithsonian Contr. Bot. 61.
- Case, F. W. 1987. Orchids of the western Great Lakes region, rev. ed. Bull. Cranbrook Inst. Sci. 48.
- Coleman, R. A. 1995. The Wild Orchids of California. Ithaca, N.Y.
- Correll, D. S. 1950. Native Orchids of North America North of Mexico. Waltham, Mass.
- Dressler, R. L. 1981. The Orchids: Natural History and Classification. Cambridge, Mass. Dressler, R. L. 1993. Phylogeny and Classification of the Orchid Family. Portland.
- Homoya, M. A. 1993. Orchids of Indiana. Bloomington.
- Liggio, J. and A. Liggio. 1999. Wild Orchids of Texas. Austin.
- Luer, C. A. 1972. The Native Orchids of Florida. Bronx.
- Luer, C. A. 1975. The Native Orchids of the United States and Canada, Excluding Florida. Bronx.
- Magrath, L. K. 1973. The Native Orchids of the Prairies and Plains Region of North America. Ph.D. dissertation. University of Kansas.
- Morris, F. and E. A. Eames. 1929. Our Wild Orchids: Trails and Portraits. New York.
- Pridgeon, A. M., P. J. Cribb, and F. N. Rasmussen. 1999+. Genera Orchidacearum. 1+ vol. Oxford.
- Rasmussen, F. N. 1985. Orchids. In: R. M. T. Dahlgren et al. 1995. The Families of the Monocotyledons: Structure, Evolution, and Taxonomy. Berlin etc. Pp. 249274.
- Sheehan, T. J. and M. Sheehan. 1994. An Illustrated Survey of Orchid Genera. Portland. Smith, W. R. 1993. Orchids of Minnesota. Minneapolis.
- Szlachetko, D. L. 1995. Systema orchidalium. Fragm. Florist. Geobot., suppl. 3.
- Whiting, R. E. and P. M. Catling. 1986. Orchids of Ontario: An Illustrated Guide. Ottawa.
- Williams, J. G. and A. E. Williams. 1983. Field Guide to Orchids of North America. New York.
Footnotes
- Gustavo A. Romero-González, Germán Carnevali Fernández-Concha, Robert L. Dressler, Lawrence K. Magrath & George W. Argus "Orchidaceae". in Flora of North America Vol. 26 Page 15, 16, 17, 26, 27, 490, 491, 617. Oxford University Press. Online at EFloras.org.
Sources
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