The story of the orchid Flickingeria praetermissa
Back in 2006, I was given a digital copy of Philippine orchid types kept at the Oakes Ames herbarium in Harvard by slain botanist Leonardo L. Co and trying to match Philippine orchid checklists at that time, I noticed that there was a sheet named Dendrobium forcipatum , an unpublished name attributed to Oakes Ames. Further investigation revealed that Ames gave the name Dendrobium forcipatum to the specimens collected by C.A. Wenzel (Wenzel 65) in Dagami, Puguahaan, Leyte in May 17, 1913 but apparently did not publish a description paper; there is not even a record of the name in Index Kewensis nor at the International Plant Names Index. Later in 1920, J.J. Smith described a plant that was in cultivation in Bogor, Java, Indonesia, but of unknown provenance and named it as Dendrobium forcipatum J.J. Smith , which is now considered to be conspecific with Flickingeria appendiculata (Bl.) Hawkes (Seidf., 1980) and is clearly not identical to Ames’ plant. Now let's take a step back....