Bulbophyllum scaberulum(Rolfe) Bolus

WFO wfo-0000613481 Accepted WFO 2026-06 3 photographs CC0

Plate 1 figs. a–c · 1 observation

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 1 time, so some figures below are different views of the same plant, taken on the same day, rather than different individuals. They are usually different parts of it: the leaf, the flower, the bark.

Bulbophyllum scaberulum, photographed by Klaus Wehrlin
fig. a Klaus Wehrlin, CC0 1.0 / 2019-08-09 / obs. 55539801

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

The specimen a real sheet, in a real collection

Herbarium
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
Accession
K000317175
Filed as
Bulbophyllum scaberulum var. crotalicaudatum J.J.Verm.
Det. by
Vermeulen, J.J.
Collected
Moreau, W.M. 1942-12-02
Origin
TZ
The sheet
View the digitised specimen (CC BY 4.0)

A real pressed plant, in a real collection, under the accession number above. Not an illustration of one. The holding institution does not serve this sheet’s image to third parties, so there is no photograph here. The record is real and the link goes to it. Where we hold no openly licensed sheet for a species this section is simply absent, and where a sheet never recorded who determined it, that field stays empty rather than being filled in. Roughly half of all herbarium sheets never recorded a determiner, which is ordinary.

Native range 27 botanical countries

Regions where Bulbophyllum scaberulum is native: Angola, Cameroon, Cape Provinces, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, DR Congo, Ethiopia, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea, Gulf of Guinea Is., Ivory Coast, Kenya, KwaZulu-Natal, Liberia, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Sudan-South Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe AngolaCameroonCape ProvincesCentral African RepublicChadCongoDR CongoEthiopiaGabonGhanaGuineaGulf of Guinea Is.Ivory CoastKenyaKwaZulu-NatalLiberiaMalawiMozambiqueNigeriaRwandaSierra LeoneSudan-South SudanTanzaniaTogoUgandaZambiaZimbabwe
Native distribution of Bulbophyllum scaberulum, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Angola ANG AFRICA
Cameroon CMN
Cape Provinces CPP
Central African Republic CAF
Chad CHA
Congo CON
DR Congo ZAI
Ethiopia ETH
Gabon GAB
Ghana GHA
Guinea GUI
Gulf of Guinea Is. GGI
Ivory Coast IVO
Kenya KEN
KwaZulu-Natal NAT
Liberia LBR
Malawi MLW
Mozambique MOZ
Nigeria NGA
Rwanda RWA
Sierra Leone SIE
Sudan-South Sudan SUD
Tanzania TAN
Togo TOG
Uganda UGA
Zambia ZAM
Zimbabwe ZIM

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Where it actually grows measured, from 38 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 7.8 °C 11.1 °C 15.3 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 24.5 °C 25.3 °C 28.1 °C
Annual rainfall 1,146 mm 1,188 mm 1,693 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 2 mm 123 mm 147 mm

It is barely found anywhere that freezes. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 38 research-grade observations of Bulbophyllum scaberulum that carry a coordinate, and this is the range those places actually span. The 5th and 95th percentiles are used rather than the minimum and maximum, because a single cultivated specimen in a heated conservatory should not widen a tropical plant's range to the Arctic.

This is not a hardiness zone. A USDA zone is the average annual extreme minimum temperature. The figure above is the mean daily minimum of the coldest month, which is a different quantity and is typically far warmer. Reading one as the other would place a plant several zones too warm, so we do not publish a hardiness zone, because we do not have one.

Also published as 23 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Bulbophyllum bambiliense De Wild.
  • Bulbophyllum chevalieri De Wild.
  • Bulbophyllum clarkei (Rolfe) Schltr.
  • Bulbophyllum congolanum Schltr.
  • Bulbophyllum ealaense De Wild.
  • Bulbophyllum eburneum (Pfitzer) De Wild.
  • Bulbophyllum fuerstenbergianum (De Wild.) De Wild.
  • Bulbophyllum jespersenii De Wild.
  • Bulbophyllum pobeguinii (Finet) De Wild.
  • Bulbophyllum scaberulum var. album Pérez-Vera
  • Bulbophyllum summerhayesii A.D.Hawkes
  • Bulbophyllum zobiaense De Wild.
  • Megaclinium bambiliense De Wild.
  • Megaclinium chevalieri De Wild.
  • Megaclinium clarkei Rolfe
  • Megaclinium congolanum (Schltr.) T.Durand & H.Durand
  • Megaclinium ealaense De Wild.
  • Megaclinium eburneum Pfitzer
  • Megaclinium fuerstenbergianum De Wild.
  • Megaclinium jespersenii De Wild.
  • Megaclinium pobeguinii Finet
  • Megaclinium scaberulum Rolfe
  • Megaclinium zobiaense De Wild.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.