Tolumnia variegata (Harlequin dancing-lady orchid)

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 6 observations

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 6 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.

Tolumnia variegata, photographed by Wes Gapp — fig. a Wes Gapp, CC BY 4.0 / 2021-02-12 / obs. 112723286

Tolumnia variegata, photographed by botanygirl — fig. b botanygirl, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 14049625

Tolumnia variegata, photographed by Jason Hernandez — fig. c Jason Hernandez, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 89531132

Tolumnia variegata, photographed by Brian Oakes Haiti Hunter — fig. d Brian Oakes Haiti Hunter, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 185877501

Tolumnia variegata, photographed by Yolanda M. Leon — fig. f Yolanda M. Leon, CC0 1.0 / obs. 127912303

Tolumnia variegata, photographed by Jim Kingdon — fig. g Jim Kingdon, CC0 1.0 / obs. 8129579

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 6 botanical countries

Native distribution of Tolumnia variegata, 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.

Region	TDWG code	Continent
Cayman Is.	CAY	SOUTHERN AMERICA
Cuba	CUB
Dominican Republic	DOM
Haiti	HAI
Leeward Is.	LEE
Puerto Rico	PUE

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.

Also published as 29 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.

Cymbidium variegatum (Sw.) Sw.
Epidendrum carinatum Vahl
Epidendrum haseltonianum A.D.Hawkes
Epidendrum variegatum Sw.
Oncidium caymanense Moir
Oncidium cubense Moir
Oncidium furcyense Moir
Oncidium leiboldii Rchb.f.
Oncidium leiboldii var. album Moir & A.D.Hawkes
Oncidium leiboldii var. majus Moir & A.D.Hawkes
Oncidium variegatum (Sw.) Sw.
Oncidium variegatum f. album (Moir & A.D.Hawkes) Withner
Oncidium variegatum f. furcyense (Moir) Withner
Oncidium variegatum f. majus (Moir & A.D.Hawkes) Withner
Oncidium variegatum f. purpureum (Moir) Withner
Oncidium variegatum f. roseum (Moir & A.D.Hawkes) Withner
Oncidium variegatum f. varvelum (Moir) Withner
Oncidium variegatum subsp. leiboldii (Rchb.f.) Withner
Oncidium variegatum subsp. velutinum (Lindl. & Paxton) Withner
Oncidium variegatum var. purpureum Moir & A.D.Hawkes
Oncidium variegatum var. roseum Moir & A.D.Hawkes
Oncidium variegatum var. velutinum (Lindl. & Paxton) Griseb.
Oncidium varvelum Moir
Oncidium velutinum Lindl. & Paxton

and 5 more.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
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.