coChlioda. 187 



COCHLIODA. 



Lindl. Fol. Orch. 1853. Benth. et Hook. Gen. Plant. III. p. 531 (1883). 

 Lindley founded tlie genus Cochlioda on a Peruvian species 

 discovered by Matthews in 1838,* but which he did not publish 

 till 1853. He had_, however, previous to the last named date 

 described another species that had been discovered by Hartweg as 

 Odontoglossum roseum.,] but which conforms to Matthews^ ^jps in 

 all its essential characters. When, some years later, Reichenbach 

 compiled a synopsis of the Orchide^ for Walper's Annates Botanices 

 he referred one of the true Cochliodas {G. sanguinea) also Ada 

 aurantiaca and one or two more species to his own genus Mesospinidium 

 which he had proposed some time before for a small-flowered, 

 paniculate Odontoglossum. To these he subsequently added Lindley 's 

 Odontoglossum roseum and another Peruvian species here described 

 as CochUoda vulcanica ; hence it happened that three of the four 

 species described in the following pages became known in gardens 

 under genera to which they did not belong. 



Cochlioda as defined by Mr. Bentham in the Genera Plantarum 

 is a very natural genus including about half a dozen species, all 

 inhabiting the Andes of northern Peru and Ecuador at a considerable 

 altitude. The essential characters of the genus are seen chiefly in 

 the labellum which is adnate to the column, in two or three species 

 almost to its apex, whence the Cochliodas have been likened to an 

 Epidendrum with the habit of an Odontoglossum, the pollinary 

 apparatus too being almost like that of the latter genus. The 

 species are also distinguished by their bright rose or rose-scarlet 

 flowers which render them very ornamental in contrast with the 

 white, yellow and brown of the allied genera Odontoglossum and 

 Oncidium. 



Cultaral Note. — As the Cochliodas occur on the Andes of South 

 America at 5,000 — 10.000 feet elevation they live under the same 

 or nearly the same climatic conditions as the Odontoglots indigenous 

 to the same vertical range ; their cultural treatment should therefore 

 be the same as that for Odontoglossum which is fully detailed under 

 that genus. 



Cochlioda Noezliana. 



P.seu(lo-lnilbs ovoid-oblong, much compressed, 1^ — 2 inches long, 

 mono diphyllous. Leaves linear-oblong, acute, 4 — 6 inches long. Peduncles 



* Cochlioda dendflora, not in cultivation. 

 + In Bentham's Plant. Hartweg, p. 151 (1844). 



