Nordic Journal of Botany 27: 460Á468, 2009 doi: 10.1111/j.1756-1051.2009.00465.x, # The Authors. Journal compilation # Nordic Journal of Botany 2009 Subject Editor: Petra Korall. Accepted 14 July 2009 Cephalanthera exigua rediscovered: new insights in the taxonomy, habitat requirements and breeding system of a rare mycoheterotrophic orchid Henrik Æ. Pedersen, Santi Watthana, Me´lanie Roy, Somran Suddee and Marc-Andre´ Selosse H. Æ. Pedersen (
[email protected]), Botanical Garden and Museum, Natural History Museum of Denmark, Univ. of Copenhagen, Gothersgade 130, DKÁ1123 Copenhagen K, Denmark. Á S. Watthana, Queen Sirikit Botanic Garden, PO Box 7, Mae Rim, Chiang Mai 50180, Thailand. Á M. Roy and M.-A. Selosse, Centre d’Ecologie Fonctionnelle et Evolutive, 1919 route de Mende, FRÁ34293 Montpellier cedex 05, France. Á S. Suddee, Forest Herbarium (BKF), National Park, Wildlife and Plant Conservation Department, Chatuchak, Bangkok 10900, Thailand. Five mycoheterotrophic species of Cephalanthera have been proposed from tropical Asia. Until recently, all of them were only known from the type specimens, for which reason it has been difficult to judge if some of them were actually conspecific. The recent discovery of two large populations of C. exigua in Thailand made it possible to describe the range of variation of this species in much more detail, and we then found it to be well distinguished from the others. A phylogenetic analysis based on nuclear rDNA ITS sequences corroborated the systematic position of C. exigua at the generic level. Examination of the previously neglected type of C. pusilla from Myanmar lead to the conclusion that this taxon of disputed generic affinity likewise belongs to Cephalanthera, and that it is a clearly distinct species.