Botany: stem in a single direction; cellular pollinium stalk, = stipe; superposed pollinia; incumbent anther, that bends early in development.
Vandeae: 130 genera; 1700 species; tropical.
Epidendroideae: ± 100 genera; ± 10000 species; tropical; mostly epiphytes; usually pseudobulbs; single anther, incumbent, forming a right angle with the column axis or pointed backward in many genera; hard pollinia, a mass of waxy pollen or of coherent pollen grains; pollinia with caudicle and viscidium or without; stigma entire or 3-lobed; rostellum present; 1-locular ovary; leaves distichous or spiraling.
TaxonomyVandeae and Epidendreae form a monophyletic clade in the
Orchidaceae, with the restriction that the old Tribe Epidendreae was split in 2 Tribes Epidendreae. This had to be done as it was shown Epidendreae was polyphyletic. The other part of Epidendreae is in
Dendrobioideae.
Linnaeus named all new orchids Epidendron, which means growing on trees, assuming they were one genus. The genus Epidendron became huge and had to be split later in various genera. A similar situation was still the case with the Tribe Epidendreae.
In the
Plant theory they are taken together as
Vandoideae.
Vandoideae is in
Subphase 5 of the
Orchidales. As such they are at the level of
Family and could be named Vandaceae.