The metapopulation concept is widely established in population biology. It predicts that the likelihood of colonization of an empty patch is positively correlated with its connectivity, because colonizers from occupied patches will be more likely to reach an empty patch if they are closer to it. Another prediction is that the likelihood of extinction of an occupied patch will be negatively correlated with its connectivity to other patches, as the occupied patch can be ‘reinforced’ by immigrants from patches that are close by. We tested these predictions using an extensive data set for an epiphytic orchid, Lepanthes rupestris from Puerto Rico. Our data did not support the first prediction, but we found that the likelihood of extinction is negatively correlated with patch connectivity. We hypothesize that this might be because most orchid seeds are wind dispersed and seeds that do not fall immediately below the mother plant are uniformly distributed after a steep leptokurtic distribution. We predict that taxa with similar seed and gene flow characteristics should show similar patterns in the association between colonization/extinction rates and patch connectivity. © 2014 The Linnean Society of London, Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society, 2014, 175, 598–606.