Bifrenaria magnicalcarata (Hoehne) Pabst
 

This is a relatively large plant with angled pseudo bulbs and showy flowers. The flowers have a distinctively long calcar, or spurlike structure, and Hoehne, taking this into account, described it as B. tyrianthina var. magnicalcarata. Pabst was convinced that the long calcar was a characteristic strong enough to allow splitting it into its own taxon and elevated it to species category. What is hard to understand is why Kew Checklist insists in placing it as a synonym to B. tyrianthina!

Here are the flowers:
Bifrenaria magnicalcarata (Hoehne) Pabst on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

The plant and flowers:
Bifrenaria magnicalcarata (Hoehne) Pabst on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

Detail of the hairy lip:
Bifrenaria magnicalcarata (Hoehne) Pabst on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

Lovely, Mauro. I'm thinking I should try one or two.

Kim

great plant, Mauro! How large is it?

She's really cute, Mauro.

That's a very beautiful orchid! I love the hairy lip:drool: Do the blooms stay a bit 'cupped' or do they open further later?

The plant is in a 25cm (diameter) pot and already at the rim and is 35cm tall, Ramón. But Bifrenarias are cool plants! Today I photographed another species I grow, Bifrenaria silvana, which is not taller than 8 cm!! A true mini species! I'm posting it soon.


Yes, Camille, they are not flat, they are a little bell shapped. But that's exactly, in my opinion, what makes them so cool! Bifrenaria reminds me a little of some Lycastes which I can't grow here (temperatures);) !

Mauro, no matter what you post pictures of, I enjoy looking. Your photos are always brilliant! Thank you for sharing.

Thanks, Mauro! I also checked for the silvana.. wow, another beauty... looking forward to seeing the pictures of your plant :)

:iagree: with everything jkofferdahl said.

It's always a treat seeing what you've posted.

HI MAURO
Your photos are spectacular, can you tell me what kind of camera and lenses you use ??? The lip is taken by a macro isn't it...
That plant is beutifull... CONGRATS!!!

Hi Beto
My camera is a semi-pro DSC-H5 equipped with a Vario-Tessar 2,8-3,7/6-72 Carl Zeiss Lens. This camera macro feature is powerful enough to produce that lip image you see in this thread without lens changing. Using it in the manual mode and under adequate light this camera can capture flowers as small as some Stelis of no more than half a centimeter across.

Very nice Mauro. Many years ago (early 1970's) I bought a plant from a dealer in Brazil (Lotus Osiris I think it was called) and it was labelled as Bifrenaria harrisoniae (may have the spellignwrong) and the flowers (from memory) look a bit like your photos. I checked my plant out (when it first bloomed) against the paintings in one of the volumes of Heihne's Orchidaceae of Brasil and I think also in his Iconogrpahia do Orchidaceae do Brasil. What is the difference between the two species? Obviously one must have a long spur:)

Hi Mike,
First, let me say that Hoehne, recognising that the long spur in some flowers of Bifrenaria tyrianthina had enough taxonimic relevance described a variety he called Bifrenaria tyrianthina var. magnicalcarata. Later, Guido Pabst assumed that this characteristic was stable and spread enough to justify lifting the variety to the status of species, thus describing Bifrenaria magnicalcarata.
So, Bifrenaria magnicalcarata would have in the long calcar its main difference when compared to Bifrenaria tyrianthina and especially with Bifrenaria harrisoniae. Another difference is that in Bifrenaria magnicalcarata the inflorescence is sometimes higher than the leaves, but this never happens in Bif. harrisoniae.
More recently (2003) Campacci made a review of the genus. In his review he says that not only Hohene was wrong in considering the flowers with long spur a variety, but Pabst too in lifting the Hoehne's variety to the status of a new species. He says that both Hoehne and Pabst had actually Bif. tyrianthina in hands and just made some confusion. He sustains that the long spur is a characteristic of Bif. tyrianthina and by consequence B. tyrianthina var. magnicalcarata Hoehne and Bif. magnicalcarata (Hoehne) Pabst are synonyms to Bif tyrianthina. In any case, the main difference between tyrianthina and harrisoniae continue to be the long spur basically.

Thanks Rosim/Mauro. I must look at my pictures of my plant and see if I can recognise the characters that you mention. I must also look and see if I made a record of the flower when it flowered some time (years) ago.