Last week I featured the tallest orchid in the world, so this week I’m going to talk about the smallest orchid in the world: Platystele jungermannioides. This little guy was discovered accidentally by American botanist Lou Jost as he was inspecting a completely separate plant from Ecuador. He found it growing among the roots of the other plant! According to an article in The Independent, this orchid is 2.1 mm wide; here’s a photo with a ruler for reference:
A dime is about 1 mm thick and a nickel is about twice as thick as a dime; large grains of sand can be about 2 mm in size, so this gives you a concrete sense of just how miniscule the orchid really is. Here is the Platystele jungermannioides in bloom next to a toothpick…a freaking toothpick!!
…and here it is, in bloom, next to a human finger:
In addition to Ecuador, the orchid is found in Mexico, Guatemala, Costa Rica, and Panama.
And now, on to the scientific classification:
Family: Orchidaceae (Duh…maybe I should start omitting the family from this section.)
Subfamily: Epidendroideae
Tribe: Epidendreae
Subtribe: Pleurothallidinae
Genus: Platystele
Ahhh….the wonders of nature. Incroyable!!
3 comments
Kristianstad, Sweden 20.07.2013
To whom it may concern
Whilst you may have considered this Platystele species as the smallest orchid in the world it could be of interest to point out three challengers from Europe; Malaxis monophyllos, Hammarby paludosa and especially Herminium monorchis. All of these three have flowers measuring maximum 2 mm in size. There are at least 3 – 5 others that have a flower size of between 2/3 – 5 mm, namely; Liparis loeselii, Neottia cordata, Pseudorchis albida, Dactylorhiza viridis, and maybe Goodyera repens and Corallorhiza trifida.
With Kind Regards
Fred Campbell
Kristianstad
Sweden