''Brassia'' is a

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...

orchid Orchids are plants that belong to the family Orchidaceae (), a diverse and widespread group of flowering plants with blooms that are often colourful and fragrant. Along with the Asteraceae, they are one of the two largest families of floweri ...

s classified in the subtribe Oncidiinae. It is native to

Mexico Mexico (Spanish language, Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a List of sovereign states, country in the southern portion of North America. It is borders of Mexico, bordered to the north by the United States; to the so ...

Central America Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. ...

, the

West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greate ...

, and northern

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the sou ...

, with one species (''B. caudata'') extending into

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and ...

.Kew World Checklist of Selected Plant Families
/ref> The genus was named after William Brass, a British botanist and illustrator, who collected plants in Africa under the supervision of Sir

Joseph Banks Sir Joseph Banks, 1st Baronet, (19 June 1820) was an English naturalist, botanist, and patron of the natural sciences. Banks made his name on the 1766 natural-history expedition to Newfoundland and Labrador. He took part in Captain James ...

. Its abbreviation in the horticultural trade is Brs.

Description

''Brassia''

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriat ...

and its popular hybrids are common in cultivation, and are notable for the characteristic long and spreading

tepal A tepal is one of the outer parts of a flower (collectively the perianth). The term is used when these parts cannot easily be classified as either sepals or petals. This may be because the parts of the perianth are undifferentiated (i.e. of very ...

s (in some clones longer than 50 cm), which lend them the common name spider orchid. The grex Eternal Wind is a recipient of the

Royal Horticultural Society The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS), founded in 1804 as the Horticultural Society of London, is the UK's leading gardening charity. The RHS promotes horticulture through its five gardens at Wisley (Surrey), Hyde Hall (Essex), Harlow Carr (Nor ...

Award of Garden Merit The Award of Garden Merit (AGM) is a long-established annual award for plants by the British Royal Horticultural Society (RHS). It is based on assessment of the plants' performance under UK growing conditions. History The Award of Garden Merit ...

. This epiphytic genus occurs in wet forests from sea level to altitudes under 1500 m, with the Peruvian

Andes The Andes, Andes Mountains or Andean Mountains (; ) are the longest continental mountain range in the world, forming a continuous highland along the western edge of South America. The range is long, wide (widest between 18°S – 20°S ...

as its center of diversity. Occurrence is mostly restricted to a certain area, but ''Brassia caudata'' can be found over the whole geographic area. They have large elliptic-oblong

pseudobulb The pseudobulb is a storage organ found in many epiphytic and terrestrial sympodial orchids. It is derived from a thickening of the part of a stem between leaf nodes and may be composed of just one internode or several, termed heteroblastic and ...

s with one or two leaves at the apex, lateral, unbranched many-flowered

inflorescence An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Morphologically, it is the modified part of the shoot of seed plants where flowers are forme ...

s with small floral

bract In botany, a bract is a modified or specialized leaf, especially one associated with a reproductive structure such as a flower, inflorescence axis or cone scale. Bracts are usually different from foliage leaves. They may be smaller, larger, or o ...

s. The

lip The lips are the visible body part at the mouth of many animals, including humans. Lips are soft, movable, and serve as the opening for food intake and in the articulation of sound and speech. Human lips are a tactile sensory organ, and can be ...

is not attached to the column. The

pollinarium A pollinium (plural pollinia) is a coherent mass of pollen grains in a plant that are the product of only one anther, but are transferred, during pollination, as a single unit. This is regularly seen in plants such as orchids and many species of mil ...

shows a narrow stipe. There are two distichous, foliaceous sheaths around the base, from which the inflorescence emerges. ''Brassia'' has a very specific method for pollination; it uses entomophily -

pollination Pollination is the transfer of pollen from an Stamen, anther of a plant to the stigma (botany), stigma of a plant, later enabling fertilisation and the production of seeds, most often by an animal or by Anemophily, wind. Pollinating agents can ...

by insects - and in this case specifically by female spider-hunter wasps of the genera ''

Pepsis ''Pepsis'' is a genus of spider wasps belonging to the family Pompilidae. Species within this genus are also called tarantula hawks, as they usually hunt tarantulas, similarly to many species in the genus '' Hemipepsis''. These wasps are rest ...

'' and ''

Campsomeris ''Campsomeris'' is a Neotropical genus of the family Scoliidae, also known as the scoliid wasps. They are generally parasites of beetle larvae, most often of Scarabaeidae The family Scarabaeidae, as currently defined, consists of over 30,000 ...

''. Mistaken by the

mimicry In evolutionary biology, mimicry is an evolved resemblance between an organism and another object, often an organism of another species. Mimicry may evolve between different species, or between individuals of the same species. Often, mimicry f ...

of ''Brassia'', the wasp stings the

, while trying to grasp its prey without any success. By these movements the wasp comes into contact with the pollinarium, that then sticks to its head. By flying to another ''Brassia'' flower, this flower gets pollinated.

List of species

Species accepted as of May 2014: * '' Brassia allenii'' L.O.Williams ex C.Schweinf. - Honduras, Panama * '' Brassia andina'' (Rchb.f.) M.W.Chase - Colombia, Ecuador, Peru * '' Brassia andreettae'' (Dodson) Senghas in F.R.R.Schlechter - Ecuador * '' Brassia angusta'' Lindl. - Venezuela, Guyana, northern Brazil * '' Brassia angustilabia'' Schltr. - Panama, Brazil (Amazonas) * '' Brassia arachnoidea'' Barb.Rodr. - Rio de Janeiro * ''

Brassia arcuigera ''Brassia arcuigera'', the arching brassia, is a species of orchid Orchids are plants that belong to the family Orchidaceae (), a diverse and widespread group of flowering plants with blooms that are often colourful and fragrant. Along with ...

'' Rchb.f. - Honduras, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru * '' Brassia aurantiaca'' (Lindl.) M.W.Chase - Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador * '' Brassia aurorae'' D.E.Benn. - Peru * '' Brassia bennettiorum'' (Dodson) Senghas in F.R.R.Schlechter - Peru * '' Brassia bidens'' Lindl. - Venezuela, Guyana, northern Brazil * '' Brassia bowmanii'' (Rchb.f.) M.W.Chase - Colombia * '' Brassia brachypus'' Rchb.f. - Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia * '' Brassia brevis'' (Kraenzl.) M.W.Chase - Colombia, Ecuador * '' Brassia brunnea'' Archila - Guatemala * '' Brassia caudata'' (L.) Lindl. - Mexico, Central America, Florida, Greater Antilles, Trinidad, northern South America * '' Brassia cauliformis'' C.Schweinf. - Peru * '' Brassia chloroleuca'' Barb.Rodr. - Guyana, French Guiana, Brazil * '' Brassia chlorops'' Endrés & Rchb.f. - Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama * '' Brassia cochleata'' Knowles & Westc. - northern South America * '' Brassia cyrtopetala'' Schltr. - Colombia * '' Brassia diphylla'' (H.R.Sweet) M.W.Chase - Colombia * '' Brassia dresslerorum'' Archila - Guatemala * '' Brassia ecuadorensis'' (Garay) M.W.Chase - Ecuador * '' Brassia endresii'' (Kraenzl.) ined. (syn ''Solenidium endresii'' Kraenzl.) - Central America * '' Brassia escobariana'' Garay - Colombia * '' Brassia euodes'' Rchb.f. - Colombia, Ecuador, Peru * '' Brassia farinifera'' Linden & Rchb.f. - Ecuador * '' Brassia filomenoi'' Schltr. - Peru * '' Brassia forgetiana'' Sander - Peru, Brazil, Venezuela * '' Brassia garayana'' M.W.Chase - Ecuador, Peru * '' Brassia gireoudiana'' Rchb.f. & Warsz. - Costa Rica, Panama * '' Brassia glumacea'' Lindl. - Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru * '' Brassia glumaceoides'' M.W.Chase - Colombia, Venezuela * '' Brassia horichii'' (I.Bock) M.W.Chase - Costa Rica, Panama * '' Brassia huebneri'' Schltr. - French Guiana, Brazil * '' Brassia iguapoana'' Schltr. - Brazil (Amazonas) * '' Brassia incantans'' (Rchb.f.) M.W.Chase - Colombia, Ecuador, Peru * '' Brassia jipijapensis'' Dodson & N.H.Williams - Ecuador (Manabí) * '' Brassia keiliana'' Rchb.f. ex Lindl. - Colombia, Venezuela, Guyana * '' Brassia koehlerorum'' Schltr. - Peru * '' Brassia lanceana'' Lindl. - Panama, Trinidad & Tobago, northern South America * '' Brassia macrostachya'' Lindl. - Venezuela, Guyana * ''

Brassia maculata ''Brassia maculata'', the spotted brassia, is a species of orchid. It is native to southern Mexico ( Chiapas, Veracruz, Tabasco, Guerrero, Oaxaca, Campeche, Quintana Roo), Central America (Belize Belize (; bzj, Bileez) is a Caribbean ...

'' R.Br. in W.T.Aiton - Mexico, Central America, Cuba, Jamaica * '' Brassia mendozae'' (Dodson) Senghas in F.R.R.Schlechter - Ecuador * '' Brassia minutiflora'' (Kraenzl.) M.W.Chase - Colombia * '' Brassia neglecta'' Rchb.f. - Guyana, Venezuela, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru * '' Brassia ocanensis'' Lindl. - Venezuela, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru * '' Brassia panamensis'' (Garay) M.W.Chase - Panama * '' Brassia pascoensis'' D.E.Benn. & Christenson - Peru * '' Brassia peruviana'' Poepp. & Endl. - Peru * '' Brassia pozoi'' (Dodson & N.H.Williams) Senghas in F.R.R.Schlechter - Ecuador, Peru * '' Brassia pumila'' Lindl. - Guyana, Venezuela, French Guiana, Colombia, Peru, Brazil * '' Brassia rhizomatosa'' Garay & Dunst - Venezuela, Peru * '' Brassia rolandoi'' (D.E.Benn. & Christenson) M.W.Chase - Peru * '' Brassia signata'' Rchb.f - Peru, Bolivia, Oaxaca, Guerrero * '' Brassia suavissima'' Pupulin & Bogarín - Costa Rica * '' Brassia sulphurea'' (Rchb.f.) M.W.Chase - Venezuela * '' Brassia thyrsodes'' Rchb.f. - Bolivia * '' Brassia transamazonica'' D.E.Benn. & Christenson - Peru * '' Brassia verrucosa'' Bateman ex Lindl. - Mexico, Central America, Venezuela, Brazil * '' Brassia villosa'' Lindl. - Guyana, Venezuela, Brazil * '' Brassia wageneri'' Rchb.f. - Guyana, Venezuela, Brazil, Colombia, Peru * '' Brassia warszewiczii'' Rchb.f. - Ecuador

Intergeneric hybrids

* × ''Aliceara'' (''Brassia'' × ''

Miltonia ''Miltonia'', abbreviated Milt. in the horticultural trade, is an orchid genus comprising twelve epiphyte species and eight natural hybrids. The miltonias are exclusively inhabitants of Brazil, except for one species whose range extends from Bra ...

'' × ''Oncidium'') * × ''Bakerara'' (''Brassia'' × ''Miltonia'' × ''Odontoglossum'' × ''Oncidium'') * × ''Banfieldara'' (''

Ada Ada may refer to: Places Africa * Ada Foah, a town in Ghana * Ada (Ghana parliament constituency) * Ada, Osun, a town in Nigeria Asia * Ada, Urmia, a village in West Azerbaijan Province, Iran * Ada, Karaman, a village in Karaman Province, T ...

'' × ''Brassia'' × ''Odontoglossum'' ) * × ''Brapasia'' (''

Aspasia Aspasia (; grc-gre, Ἀσπασία ; after 428 BC) was a ''metic'' woman in Classical Athens. Born in Miletus, she moved to Athens and began a relationship with the statesman Pericles, with whom she had a son, Pericles the Younger. Accor ...

'' × ''Brassia'') * × ''Brassada'' (''Ada'' × ''Brassia'') * × ''Brassidium'' (''Brassia'' × ''Oncidium'') * × ''Brassochilus'' (''Brassia'' × '' Leochilus'') * × ''Bratonia'' (''Brassia'' × ''

'') * × ''Crawshayara'' (''Aspasia'' × ''Brassia'' × ''Miltonia'' × ''Oncidium'') * × ''Degarmoara'' (''Brassia'' × ''Miltonia'' × ''Odontoglossum'' ) * × ''Derosaara'' (''Aspasia'' × ''Brassia'' × ''Miltonia'' × ''Odontoglossum'' ) * × ''Duggerara'' (''Ada'' × ''Brassia'' × ''Miltonia'') * × ''Eliara'' (''Brassia'' × '' Oncidium'' × ''

Rodriguezia ''Rodriguezia'', abbreviated Rdza. in the horticultural trade, is a genus of orchids. It consists of 49 known species, native to tropical America from southern Mexico and the Windward Islands south to Argentina, with many of the species endemic t ...

'')page 20 of http://www.cites.org/common/cop/13/E13-P41Annex.pdf * × ''Forgetara'' (''Aspasia'' × ''Brassia'' × ''Miltonia'') * × ''Johnkellyara'' (''Brassia'' × ''Leochilus'' × ''Oncidium'' × ''Rodriguezia'') * × ''Maclellanara'' (''Brassia'' × ''Odontoglossum'' × ''Oncidium'') * × ''Norwoodara'' (''Brassia'' × ''Miltonia'' × ''Oncidium'' × ''Rodriguezia'') * × ''Odontobrassia'' (''Brassia'' × ''Odontoglossum'') * × ''Pettitara'' (''Ada'' × ''Brassia'' × ''Oncidium'') * × ''Rodrassia'' (''Brassia'' × ''Rodriguezia'') * × ''Rohriara'' (''Ada'' × ''Aspasia'' × ''Brassia'') * × ''Sauledaara'' (''Aspasia'' × ''Brassia'' × ''Miltonia'' × ''Oncidium'' × ''Rodriguezia'') * × ''Shiveara'' (''Aspasia'' × ''Brassia'' × ''Odontoglossum'' × ''Oncidium'') * × ''Wingfieldara'' (''Aspasia'' × ''Brassia'' × ''Odontoglossum'') This list does not include nothogenera based on genera that are synonyms of '' Oncidium'', as for instance ''Cochlioda''. These nothogenera are now synonyms with other nothogenera in this list, or with ''Brassia'' (in the case of ''Brassioda'' = ''Brassia'' × ''Cochlioda'').

Gallery

Image:Brassia caudata .jpg, ''Brassia caudata'' Image:Brassia-girouldiana.jpg, ''Brassia girouldiana'' Image:Brassia lanceana Lindley-02.jpg, ''Brassia lanceana'' Image:Brassia-maculata.jpg, ''Brassia maculata''

References

External links

* * Pupulin, F. and Bogarin, D.: The genus Brassia in Costa Rica : A survey of four species and a new species ; Lindleyana, March 2005 - - On lin

April 2013 - - On lin

* Dressler, R.L., and N.H. Williams. 2003. ''New combinations in Mesoamerican Oncidiinae (Orchidaceae)''. Selbyana 24(1):44–45. * van der Pijl, L., and C.H. Dodson. 1966. ''Orchid Flowers: Their Pollination and Evolution.'' University of Miami Press, Coral Gables. {{Taxonbar, from=Q133793 Brassia, Oncidiinae genera Epiphytic orchids Orchids of Florida Orchids of Mexico Orchids of South America Orchids of Central America Flora of the Caribbean