Forming one of the largest families of flowering plants, orchids had adapted to live in almost every type of environment around the world. Orchids helped Charles Darwin (1809-1882) formulate his theories of natural selection and evolution. Since then, they have starred in many scientific studies on plant adaptations.
In this gallery, we'll explore the alluring world of orchids through the eyes of Darwin and those he influenced -- naturalists, horticulturists, and scientists who continue to find new insights and curious surprises while working with these captivating plants and greenhouses, laboratories, and in the wild.
"In my examination of Orchids, hardly any fact has so much struck me as the endless diversity of structure... for gaining the very same end, namely, the fertilisation of one flower by the pollen of another." -- Charles Darwin, On the various contrivances by which British and foreign orchids are fertilised by insects, 1862
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