Just HAVE to ask

[Bamanana]

I have been wondering for over a year now and I just HAVE to ask: Who is renaming all these orchids and how the heck to they come up with all these bizarre names? To me, the most challenging thing in growing orchids is knowing and pronouncing the doggone names. I just need to understand what the deal is here. Wuttiphanara Manoonya? Myrmecatavola? Phaiocalanthe? Guarechea? Haraella Retrocalla ? These are all in my collection and I haven't the foggiest notion of how to pronounce them. I usually just give them my own common names (Joe, Sue, Mike) so I know what to call them when I share pictures or talk about them. Please school me on orchid names before my head explodes.

[Subrosa]

Originally Posted by Bamanana

I have been wondering for over a year now and I just HAVE to ask: Who is renaming all these orchids and how the heck to they come up with all these bizarre names? To me, the most challenging thing in growing orchids is knowing and pronouncing the doggone names. I just need to understand what the deal is here. Wuttiphanara Manoonya? Myrmecatavola? Phaiocalanthe? Guarechea? Haraella Retrocalla ? These are all in my collection and I haven't the foggiest notion of how to pronounce them. I usually just give them my own common name so I know what to call them when I share pictures or talk about them. Please school me on orchid names before my head explodes.

Learning a little Latin will take you a long way in pronouncing and understanding most scientific names, but obviously won't help much with names in other languages, such as your "Wuttiphanara Manoonya".

[estación seca]

When you create and flower a new hybrid you can call it almost anything you wish.

[Louis_W]

Latin names are very confusing at first but there is actually a lot of sense to them once you learn a little about what all the suffixes mean.

Yours are extra troublesome because many of them are hybrids between two genus in which they fuse two latin in names into one :

Myrmecatavola = Myrmecophila + Cattleya + Brassavola

One of those genus can illustrate the suffixes:

Myrmeco- having to do with ants
phila- lover of

Myrmecophilia is an orchid that has chambers in the pseudobulbs which have evolved as to house ants which go nuts on anything that try to hurt the plant.



Orchids are also named after people, places, unique features and whatever else the person naming them wants. Don't be too intimidated. It is confusing and there is a lot to learn but it isn't complete chaos

---------- Post added at 12:16 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:14 PM ----------

P.S. Wuttiphanara Manoonya seems like Australian species names after aboriginal words. Just a guess...

[claypot]

The guys who control species names are the Royal Horticultural Society in conjunction with Kew Gardens in London. It is all most confusing to most of us but we are told the changes are due to molecular DNA breakdowns which are supposed to determine the "Real and Accurate" plant family derivations. To us mere mortals most of the changes are just not logical - like when the told us that all Odontoglossums are really Oncidiums! Some do the full circle back to original names like some Maxillaria. I have to admit that I have never changed a label on any plant, but I suppose that people into showing must be seen to adhere to the "correct" name of the day.

[Bamanana]

Originally Posted by Louis_W

Yours are extra troublesome because many of them are hybrids between two genus in which they fuse two latin in names into one :

Myrmecatavola = Myrmecophila + Cattleya + Brassavola

One of those genus can illustrate the suffixes:

Myrmeco- having to do with ants
phila- lover of

Myrmecophilia is an orchid that has chambers in the pseudobulbs which have evolved as to house ants which go nuts on anything that try to hurt the plant.

This response is totally cool! I must confess that languages have never been a long suit, but I am a total science nerd. What else do you have that is this cool?

[estación seca]

Go find a copy of an older book: Botanical Latin by Stearn.

[Keysguy]

I'm actually OK when they come up with new intergeneric names. It makes the nametag much shorter (usually) compared to "whoseymawhatchit Smith x macothrompopedia Jones". When that gets shortened to "whomopedia Wilson", I'm a happy camper. Except for the part where I have to make all new tags.

[Roberta]

For help with pronunciation, take a look at this reference from the American Orchid Society
Orchids A to Z

The renaming makes all of us crazy. But we also need to "follow the science" and the ever-improving techniques for sequencing DNA have brought lots of surprises. Taxonomy (Systemetics) is the process of understanding what is related to what, so this has gotten very "interesting". Prior names were based largely on morphology. Unfortunately, lots of good information has gotten lost in the renaming process... "Sophronitis" is now Cattleya, but when I hear "Sophronitis" I think of small, brilliantly-colored flowers that need good water and some shade, prefer temperatures on the cool side. The traditional "Cattleya" plants tend to need bright light, and are not particularly fussy about water quality, typically want a bit of warmth though that varies by species. So you have to dig down to the species level and look up habitat information to make sense of how to actually take care of a given plant.

[Diane56Victor]

According to orchidroots your Wuttiphanara Manoonya is a cross between Rhynvandopsis Dixie Delight and Perreiraara Bangkok Sunset.

From what I can see the first name comes from the person who registered the plant K.S. Wuttiphan in 2016

Pretty thing.