84 THE ORCHID REVIEW. 
but apparently forming lines parallel to the main chain of granite 
mountains which forms the backbone of the Peninsula. Orchids are here 
very plentiful, growing both on the weathered pinnacles of rock and on 
‘the small trees and shrubs growing in the crevices. The rocks of the 
Lankawi Islands, which have produced so many peculiar plants of all 
orders, are also of limestone. 
The rainfall being very heavy, and spread over the whole year, there is 
no distinction of wet and dry seasons; this is probably the reason why 
there is no special flowering season for most Orchids. The greater part 
of the species flower at longer or shorter intervals throughout the year, 
though, perhaps, more may be found in bloom in the first three months. 
Calanthe curculigoides and Grammatophyllum speciosum are exceptions, 
the former flowering regularly in November, the latter in August or 
September. Saprophytic plants appear generally when hot and dry 
weather follows heavy rains; and this applies not only to Orchids, such 
as Lecanorchis and Didymoplexis, but also to the Burmanniacee and 
saprophytes of other orders; so that when one or other of these is found, 
the others may be expected to be in flower as well; but merely clearing a 
track through the jungle will often cause these plants to appear in a few 
weeks, whatever be the weather. A certain number of species flower 
irregularly throughout the year, and are indeed rarely out of flower. 
Others, of which Dendrobium crumenatum is the best known, invariably 
produce their flowers simultaneously on certain days. The special day 
holds good throughout the district, almost every plant bursts into blossom, 
and may remain in flower but a few hours, sometimes a whole day; after 
which the flowers wither and no more appear till the next flowering day- 
Even plants brought from as far north as Siam to Singapore conform 
immediately to the Singapore day, and do not flower on that of their native 
place. Observation seems to show no correlation with the weather ; though 
if there is very heavy rain on the day that the flowers are ready to open, 
they usually delay it till it is over. Besides Dendrobium crumenatum, 
D. teres, D. Kunstleri, D. criniferum and other species of the Desmotrichum 
section of Dendrobium, Bulbophyllum concinnum, B. macranthum, Eria 
floribunda, E. densa, etc., behave in this way. The advantages for purports: 
of fertilization, especially in the case of plants producing flowers singly, 15 
obvious ; for were these to flower one at a time, as their blossoms are but 
short-lived, they would run a great risk of not being fertilized at all. But 
what causes the plants to break out uu bloom on a definite day is not at 
all clear. 
There is a considerable variation in the method of opening of the flowers. 
In some, all the flowers in the raceme open simultaneously, as in 
Cirrhopetalum. Others produce a raceme which, growing and elongating 
aie 
