Paph affine vs. villosum

paphioboy · Oct 12, 2008

Lance (Birk), here are the pics you requested of paph affine and villosum. Sorry for the awkward angle that doesn't quite show the plants from the side, but you can kinda see the differences.. Affine holds its leaves more erect and the leaves are shorter while villosum has more curved, longer leaves. I wonder if this difference in leaves is substantial enough to separate affine from villosum.

I also read somewhere (I think Dr. Tanaka's site) that affine is supposedly a natural hybrid of appletonianum and villosum. Any thoughts..?
Paph affine:

Paph villosum:

BTW, both have yet to bloom for me so I don't have any flower pics to compare... Feel free to add to this thread...

Lance Birk · Oct 13, 2008

Thanks for those photos Paphioboy. When I read your post I thought you had a plant of the supposed natural hybrid of P. appletonianum x P. villosum. I used to have oe of those plants myself, many years ago, and I have since lost it. I have never seen another one like it and am interested in finding anyone who has one.

If you ever see a flower of this supposed natural hybrid I would appreciate photos of the flower and of the plant, as well as any information about its original habitat and location.

In regards to the photos you posted here, could you make a note to take photos of the flowers of each of these plants. And, could you offer any location data for either or both? If and when this happens, besides posting them here, could you also e-mail a copy directly to me at: [email protected] since I don't regularly see these posts?

P. affine is still an enigma. Koopowitz shows a picture of a painting by Woodin, labeled as such on p.133 of his new book, but he now says it isn't it. Both Cribb and Averyanov say it is a natural hybrid, like you describe, but the problem is, the original description is very vague and doesn't offer much in the way of definition. As I recall, it even lists the staminode as being upside-down, which I think was due to poor understanding of Latin by DeWilde.

Thanks for your interest.

LB

tomkalina · Oct 13, 2008

Paph affine vs villosum

Hi Lance/ Paphioboy,

Here's a photo of Paph. affine `Birchpoint' which has been in our collection for many years. Not sure if this is the (appletonianum x villosum) natural hybrid, but the leaf tesselations lead me to believe those two species could be the parents.

Thanks,

Tom

SlipperKing · Oct 13, 2008

Nice followup info Tom. Interesting flower as well.

slippertalker · Oct 13, 2008

The most recent information I have seen indicates that P.affine is the plant that is typically grown as P. gratrixianum. The "true" P. gratrixianum has been refound in nature according to Christiansen (published in Orchid Digest).
Koopowitz previously had indicated his suspicion that P. affine is our P.gratrixianum also.

It will be interesting to see the taxonomists dissect this line of reasoning....

paphioboy · Oct 13, 2008

Lance, i will take pics when they bloom... I have no data on location as these are nursery-raised from seed plants.. But I could ask the seller where he got the seeds from... Tom, that's a nice affine, (if that's what it is..)

The most recent information I have seen indicates that P.affine is the plant that is typically grown as P. gratrixianum. The "true" P. gratrixianum has been refound in nature according to Christiansen (published in Orchid Digest).
Koopowitz previously had indicated his suspicion that P. affine is our P.gratrixianum also.

It will be interesting to see the taxonomists dissect this line of reasoning....

More confusion...!! NNooooo!!!

Eric Muehlbauer · Oct 13, 2008

I was about to post the same thing....that "affine" is what we have assumed is gratrixianum. I had a plant of "real" gratrixianum. The leaves are much wider..like a complex hybrid. the flower is pretty much standard gratrixianum...........Eric

Kevin · Oct 14, 2008

Now I'm confused! I've never seen a real affine, but from all the pictures I've seen, they don't look anything like gratrixianum. How can the two get mixed up?

Drorchid · Oct 14, 2008

Paph. affine 'Westwood'

As promised some pictures of our Paph. affine; it has the clonal name 'Westwood'. I agree, that to me it probably looks like a natural hybrid between P. appletonianum and P. villosum.

Robert

slippertalker · Oct 14, 2008

Kevin said:
Now I'm confused! I've never seen a real affine, but from all the pictures I've seen, they don't look anything like gratrixianum. How can the two get mixed up?

The problem apparently is that some have though that the plant shown below was the true affine. The plant that is commonly grown as gratrixianum is actually affine. It has rather narrow leaves with prominent spotting at the base and a long infloresence. As Eric mentions, the "true" gratrixianum is extremely rare in cultivation and has quite wide leaves compared to affine.

Read the recent article in Orchid Digest for a picture and a discussion of the two species.

Rob's plant is an obvious hybrid, perhaps a natural hybrid.

paphioboy · Oct 14, 2008

Thanks for the pics, Robert...

Nice 'affine' you have there... Well, please bear in mind that my plants are small cos they're grown in the tropics (less than optimum conditions)... I have seen real flowering size villosum in Adelaide and they dwarf my plant considerably... :sob: :sob:

JeanLux · Oct 15, 2008

slippertalker said:
The problem apparently is that some have though that the plant shown below was the true affine. The plant that is commonly grown as gratrixianum is actually affine. It has rather narrow leaves with prominent spotting at the base and a long infloresence. As Eric mentions, the "true" gratrixianum is extremely rare in cultivation and has quite wide leaves compared to affine.

....

what do you think of this one!!??? => affine?? Jean

paphioboy · Oct 15, 2008

Well, sure looks like my affine...

Or the regular 'gratrixianum'... Did you get it as an affine or gratrix, Jean..?

JeanLux · Oct 15, 2008

paphioboy said:
Well, sure looks like my affine... Or the regular 'gratrixianum'... Did you get it as an affine or gratrix, Jean..?

as gratrixianum!!

slippertalker · Oct 15, 2008

That plant is what is now being termed the actual affine but commonly grown as gratrixianum. Note the prominent spotting basally and the narrow leaves.

Paph affine vs. villosum

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