# Did orchids evolve in North America? **URL:** \ **Category:** Nature Talk\ **Tags:** article, botany, evolution\ **Created:** [June 24, 2026, 4:57pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/did-orchids-evolve-in-north-america/80674 "2026-06-24T16:57:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![AdamWargon](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/adamwargon/32/44649_2.png) [@AdamWargon](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/AdamWargon)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2026, 4:57pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/did-orchids-evolve-in-north-america/80674/1 "2026-06-24T16:57:32Z")
[GBIF news release here](https://www.gbif.org/data-use/46EiDPxosoAgd2UQGPkBIq/the-roots-of-orchid-evolution?); [paper here](https://nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nph.19580) If you see a place where a taxon is highly visible, for example, cheetahs in Africa, horses in Central Asia, and hotspots of orchid diversity in the tropics, then it’s natural to think that this must be where they evolved. But it’s not always true! All three taxa mentioned above appear to have first evolved in North America. For orchids, this was determined by comparing genetics across many species (orchids have almost 30,000 species, with their highest diversity in the tropics). The paper does NOT mention iNaturalist, although ¿they do give iNaturalist credit? in a roundabout way, by mentioning GBIF a bunch of times. ---
**Author:** ![lavateraguy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/b77776/32.png) [@lavateraguy](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/lavateraguy)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2026, 8:10pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/did-orchids-evolve-in-north-america/80674/2 "2026-06-24T20:10:45Z")
The paper that proposes that orchids originated in Australia can be found at [https://givnishlab.botany.wisc.edu/Welcome\_files/Givnish%20et%20al.%202016%20orchid%20biogeography.pdf](https://givnishlab.botany.wisc.edu/Welcome_files/Givnish%20et%20al.%202016%20orchid%20biogeography.pdf) Looking at that one my interpretation of the cladogram and biogeography would be perhaps stem orchids originated in Australia, but crown orchids look as if they have a Neotropical origin. ---
**Author:** ![davidklop](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/davidklop/32/54087_2.png) [@davidklop](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/davidklop)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2026, 1:55am UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/did-orchids-evolve-in-north-america/80674/3 "2026-07-02T01:55:00Z")
Cheetahs did not evolve in North America. You may be thinking _Miracinonyx_, the “American cheetah”, which merely resembled a cheetah. ---
**Author:** ![earthknight](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/earthknight/32/32879_2.png) [@earthknight](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/earthknight)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2026, 2:47am UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/did-orchids-evolve-in-north-america/80674/4 "2026-07-02T02:47:55Z")
No, they’re correct. Cheetahs did indeed evolve in North America, it’s not confusion with _Miracinonyx_. Cheetahs are thought to have diverged from the ancestral Puma lineage around 6-8 million years ago. _Miracinonyx_ also evolved in North America, in a case of convergent evolution, but never migrated out of the Americas and eventually went extinct. - [https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/12/151208204222.htm](https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/12/151208204222.htm) - [https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s13059-015-0837-4](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s13059-015-0837-4) ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/uploads/inaturalist/original/2X/7/7831452cf7f0d653ff1ffd34176334b7ef1b6a17.png) [@system](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/system)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2026, 2:47am UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/did-orchids-evolve-in-north-america/80674/5 "2026-08-31T02:47:59Z")
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