Eulophia zollingeri(Rchb.f.) J.J.Sm.

Carrion orchid

WFO wfo-0000960380 Accepted WFO 2026-06 7 photographs CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–g · 2 observations

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 2 times, 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.

Eulophia zollingeri, photographed by Takaaki Hattori
fig. a Takaaki Hattori, CC BY 4.0 / 2019-05-26 / obs. 53095388
Eulophia zollingeri, photographed by Srinivasan Kasinathan
fig. b Srinivasan Kasinathan, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 126649892
Eulophia zollingeri, photographed by Takaaki Hattori
fig. c Takaaki Hattori, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 53095376
Eulophia zollingeri, photographed by Srinivasan Kasinathan
fig. d Srinivasan Kasinathan, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 126649909
Eulophia zollingeri, photographed by Takaaki Hattori
fig. e Takaaki Hattori, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 53095354
Eulophia zollingeri, photographed by Srinivasan Kasinathan
fig. f Srinivasan Kasinathan, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 126649928
Eulophia zollingeri, photographed by Takaaki Hattori
fig. g Takaaki Hattori, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 53095367

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.

Native range 23 botanical countries

Regions where Eulophia zollingeri is native: China South-Central, China Southeast, Japan, Nansei-shoto, Ogasawara-shoto, Taiwan, Andaman Is., Assam, Borneo, East Himalaya, India, Jawa, Malaya, Maluku, Myanmar, New Guinea, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Sulawesi, Sumatera, Thailand, Vietnam, Queensland China South-CentralChina SoutheastJapanTaiwanAssamBorneoEast HimalayaIndiaJawaMalayaMalukuMyanmarNew GuineaPhilippinesSri LankaSulawesiSumateraThailandVietnamQueensland Nansei-shotoAndaman Is.
Native distribution of Eulophia zollingeri, 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. Regions too small to draw at this scale are marked with a dot.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Andaman Is. AND ASIA-TROPICAL
Assam ASS
Borneo BOR
East Himalaya EHM
India IND
Jawa JAW
Malaya MLY
Maluku MOL
Myanmar MYA
New Guinea NWG
Philippines PHI
Sri Lanka SRL
Sulawesi SUL
Sumatera SUM
Thailand THA
Vietnam VIE
China South-Central CHC ASIA-TEMPERATE
China Southeast CHS
Japan JAP
Nansei-shoto NNS
Ogasawara-shoto OGA
Taiwan TAI
Queensland QLD AUSTRALASIA

Not drawn on the map: Ogasawara-shoto. We hold no public-domain boundary for this region, so it is listed rather than guessed at.

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 141 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 5.6 °C 12.3 °C 18.5 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 25.5 °C 29.6 °C 31.6 °C
Annual rainfall 1,734 mm 2,728 mm 4,228 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 56 mm 172 mm 692 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 141 research-grade observations of Eulophia zollingeri 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 27 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.

  • Cyrtopera formosana Rolfe
  • Cyrtopera papuana Ridl.
  • Cyrtopera rufa Thwaites
  • Cyrtopera sanguinea Lindl.
  • Cyrtopera zollingeri Rchb.f.
  • Cyrtopodium rufum (Thwaites) Trimen
  • Cyrtopodium sanguineum (Lindl.) N.E.Br.
  • Eulophia carrii C.T.White
  • Eulophia emilianae C.J.Saldanha
  • Eulophia formosana (Rolfe) Rolfe
  • Eulophia macrorhiza Blume
  • Eulophia macrorhiza var. minahassae Schltr.
  • Eulophia macrorhizon Hook.f.
  • Eulophia ochobiensis Hayata
  • Eulophia papuana (Ridl.) J.J.Sm.
  • Eulophia sanguinea (Lindl.) Hook.f.
  • Eulophia toyoshimae Nakai
  • Eulophia yushuiana S.Y.Hu
  • Eulophia zollingeri f. viride Yokota
  • Eulophia zollingerioides P.O'Byrne
  • Graphorchis macrorhiza (Blume) Kuntze
  • Graphorchis rufa (Thwaites) Kuntze
  • Graphorchis sanguinea (Lindl.) Kuntze
  • Graphorkis macrorhiza (Blume) Kuntze

and 3 more.

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. Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
  4. 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.