Habenaria macrostele Summerh. 1937 SECTION Replicatae Kranzl 1892
Photos by Bart Wursten ©, and his Flora Of Zimbabwe WebSite
Drawing by © Margonska/Szlatchecko etal 2010
LATER
EARLY 
Common Name The Large Column Habenaria
Flower Size .52" [1.3 cm]
Found in Burundi, Rwanda, Zaire, Tanzania, Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe in wet seepage zones on overlying rock in montane grasslands at elevations of 1500 to 2180 meters as a medium sized, cool to cold growing, slender terrestrial with 2 ovoid to ellipsoid tubers giving rise to an erect, stout, glabrous stem carrying 7 to 15, linear to narrowly lanceolate, acute, erect to semispread, all along the stem, decreasing in size upwards leaves that blooms in later summer and early fall on an erect, terinal, 4 to 9.6" [10 to 24 cm] long, lax, successively 25 to 40 flowered inflorescence with densely glandular on margins , shorter than the ovary floral bracts and carrying very unpleasantly scented, small, green flowers with a white center.
" Easily distinguished by the peculiar gynostemium structure. Similar to H tisseranti but H marcostele has the gunostemium distinctly stalked and H tisseranti is sessile." Szlatchecko etal 2010
Synonyms Bilabrella macrostele (Summerh.) Szlach. & Kras-Lap. 2003; Bilabrella tangheana (Geerinck) Szlach. & Kras 2009; Habenaria defleurii Geerinck 1996 publ. 1997; Habenaria tangheana Geerinck 1987; Habenaria tournayana Geerinck 1982
References W3 Tropicos,Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;
Bot. Not. 1937: 184 Summerhayes 1937
Bull. Jard. Bot. Natl. Belg. 52: 148 Geerinck 1982 as Habenaria tournayana
Flore D'Afrique Centrale [Zaire- Rwands - Burundi] Orhidaceae Premeir parte Geerink 1984;
Flore D'Afrique Centrale [Zaire- Rwands - Burundi] Orhidaceae Premeir parte Geerink 1984 as H tournayana;
Bull. Jard. Bot. Natl. Belg. 57: 482 Geerinck 1987 as Habenaria tangheana
Flora Zambesiaca Vol 11 Part 1 Pope 1995;
Belg. J. Bot. 129: 11 Geerinck 1996 publ. 1997 as Habenaria defleurii
Richardiana 3: 141 Szlach. & Kras-Lap 2003 as Bilabrella macrostele
Richardiana 9: 159 Szlach. & Kras 2009 as Bilabrella tangheana
Orchidaceae of West Central Africa Vol 1: 218 Szlatchecko etal 2010 as Bilabrella macrostele drawing good
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