Quote:
Originally Posted by LadySoren
What is Doritis? (Auto correct wants to say Doritos. Lol)
I understand they're all phals now? What was the "difference" before?
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Doritos...
Before the absorbing of Doritis into Phalaenopsis, there were only a few species of Doritis.
Most notable of the species was
Phalaenopsis (
Doritis)
pulcherrima.
I'm not familiar with the other 2 species -
Phalaenopsis (
Doritis)
buyssoniana and
Phalaenopsis (
Doritis)
regnieriana, so I will only speak of what I know; which would be -
Phalaenopsis (
Doritis)
pulcherrima.
Before plants in the genus Doritis got combined into the genus Phalaenopsis, due to DNA analysis that supports that Doritis are Phalaenopsis, there were no known Phals that grew upright.
Well...
Phalaenopsis (
Doritis)
pulcherrima naturally grows upright. So that used to be one difference.
Because
Phalaenopsis (
Doritis)
pulcherrima grew upright, they also held their leaves out horizontally instead of flopping over.
Phalaenopsis (
Doritis)
pulcherrima was also a lithophyte, growing on limestone outcrops and cliffs.
Photo evidence of the 3 previously mentioned characteristics of
Phalaenopsis (
Doritis)
pulcherrima:
http://a402.idata.over-blog.com/3/75...cherrima_2.jpg
The flowers of
Phalaenopsis (
Doritis)
pulcherrima looked a little different from the flowers of species that were often then classified as Phalaenopsis. The flowers looked closer to what Kingidium flowers looked like, particularly
Phalaenopsis deliciosa/
Kingidium deliciosum - (Kingidium is another genus that was recently absorbed into the genus Phalaenopsis as well). But the plants vegetatively didn't look like Kingidiums either.
Vegetatively Kingidiums looked a lot like Phalaenopsis, but florally looked much different.
Here's what I mean:
http://www.orchidspecies.com/orphotd...ldeliciosa.jpg
Notice when you compare the photos of
Phalaenopsis (
Doritis)
pulcherrima and
Phalaenopsis deliciosa/
Kingidium deliciosum, vegetatively they looked different enough from each other that taxonomists didn't lump Doritis with Kingidium and vice versa.
To understand what I mean about the flowers of Doritis looking like flowers of Kingidium, here're links to photos of all species that were previously classified under the genus Doritis:
IOSPE PHOTOS
IOSPE PHOTOS
IOSPE PHOTOS
Now, here's a pic of a flower from
Phalaenopsis deliciosa/
Kingidium deliciosum:
Kingidium Deliciosum 1 | Flickr - Photo Sharing!
You must understand that before the advent of DNA analysis for taxonomy, taxonomists classified plants based on morphological, (aka physical), features. Particularly, morphological [physical] features of the plant's flowers.