Studies on Oberonia 3. Aberrant flowers and other floral modifications in the orchid genus Oberonia
17 October 2017
Geiger, Daniel; Kocyan, AlexanderOrchid flowers are amongst the most conspicuous attractions that plants have generated over evolutionary epochs. However, orchid flowers have been and are still under a long-term discussion about organ homology in particular of androecium and gynoecium organs. A contribution to the clarification of organ identity orchid floral aberrations has traditionally been the study aberrant – teratologic – flowers. We here present for the first time teratological flowers within the florally smallest and inconspicuous orchid genus Oberonia and illustrate them by light and scanning electron microscopy. Pseudopeloria with half of a lateral petal transformed into lip was found in O. costeriana J.J.Sm. and O. mucronata (D.Don) Ormerod & Seidenf. A supernumerary lip is known from O. mucronata. Oberonia rufilabris Lindl. is documented with multiple aberrations: triple gynostemium and a total of 10 tepals, twin flowers, and duplicate lips. We interpret the aberrations in light of known floral developmental and organ identity information.