Although this Section of Dendrobium is poorly understood, the preponderance of characteristics places this plant within Dendrobium bilobum. Schlecter commented in the "Orchidacea of German New Guinea" that there is hardly any other section in which the distinguishing features of the species have presented such insuperable difficulties as this one. The most important characteristics in this Section seem to be the size of the leaves and their various parts, length and shape of the mentum, width of the petals and most importantly the shape of the lip. Schlechter also said that most of the individual species within Section Monanthos are inter-related and it is not easy to distinguish them. The leaves on this plant are a better fit to D. bilobum than to the closely allied species, D. erectifolium, which has much longer leaves than D. bilobum. This plant meets the description as detailed and illustrated in Lewis & Cribb's 1991 book, "Orchids of the Solomon Islands and Bougainville", although the flower size is large for D. bilobum.