Jumellea longivaginans

Recently, I got this plant labelled as Jumellea majalis, a species from Madagascar of which there is no picture around on the internet except for a photo of a herbarium specimen. Now that the flowers have opened it became clear that it is not majalis, so I started investigating and with the help of the data on Jumelleas (measurements of plant and flower parts) in Stewart's "Angraecoid Orchids" I came up with Jumellea longivaginans. This is also a species from Madagascar of which there is equally no photo available in the whole wide web. After searching for quite a while, I found a herbarium sheet of the type specimen of J. longivaginans, and the flowers are so distinct, there is not much doubt.
The plant consists of several erect stems about 30-40cm long covered with leaves. The flowers sit on fairly long pedicels with three large bracts. The sepals and petals are 20-25mm long and look like any other Jumellea. The most distinctive feature is the spur, which is in total about 10cm long. On the first 30-40mm, the spur is curved, parallel to the ovary, greenish-white and has a flat to oval cross section. Lower down, the spur becomes round, bronze in colour and curly.

This species has quickly become one of my most favoured Angraecoids!

 

Sorry, forgot to mention: When I got it, it was potted in a bark mix with styrofoam at the base of the pot. I removed everything, bark and styrofoam and put it in a slightly bigger pot with very coarse (20-30cm pieces, no fines) pine bark as I do with all my potted Angraecoids. Temperatures a never below 14°C, humidity in my greenhouse is usually around 80-90%. It stands just at the window, but with no direct sun light, except for late afternoons. I spray once or twice a day with ~400µS (rainwater with normal multipurpose fertilizer. Since I don't have it for a long time yet, I will have to see how it develops - no idea if it needs a rest or if it likes more or less light...

The whole plant is about 30-40cm tall (is that somewhat more than one foot?)

 

By the way, here is the link to the Paris herbarium entry for this species:

Fiche Taxon

 

Of course, once the flowers fall off, I will send them to you

Found this yesterday:


Most of the flowers now overflow with nectar. So, the pollinating moth does not need to get right to the end of that curled spur, which I imagine would be quite an effort...