Masdevallia navicularis Garay & Dunst 1976 SUBGENUS Polyantha SECTION Alaticaules SUBSECTION Alaticaules [Krzl.] Luer 1986
Photo by © Eric Hunt
Photo courtesy of Dale and Deni Borders
to 
Common Name The Small Boat Masdevallia [refers to the synsepal's shape]
Flower Size 3/4" [2 cm]
Found in eastern Colombia in the department of Norte de Santander and Tachira state of western Venezuela in cloud forests at elevations of 1700 to 2600 meters as a small sized, cool to cold growing, caespitose epiphyte with stout, erect ramicauls enveloped by 2 to 3 tubular sheaths carrying a single, apical, erect, thickly coriacaeous, elliptical to narowly elliptical, subacute to obtuse leaf that is cuneate below into the petiolate base and blooms in the spring on an erect, arising from low on the ramicaul, with a basal bract, congested, 12" [30 cm] long, successively several to many, single flowered, racemose, suberect, triquetrous inflorescence that lengthens as it successively blooms, with thin, imbricating, shorter to as lng as the pedicel floral bract holding the solitary flower that does not open, well above the leaf.
"The comparitively large flowers are produced successively in a gradually lengthening raceme over a long period of time, sometimes for far more than a year. The purple brown, tailess sepals are thick and rigid, smooth on the outside, but densely warty within. Together the lateral sepals form a concave, boat-shaped synsepal covered over by a narrower dorsal sepal, with the apices of all three sepals connivent. Lateral windows are formed to the interior of the flower, much in the same manner as the sepals of several species in Zootrophion." Luer 2000
Synonyms Alaticaulia navicularis (Garay & Dunst.) Luer 2006;
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; *Venezuelan Orchids Illustrated Vol 6 Dunsterville & Garay 1976 drawing fide; Orchids of Venezuela An Illustrated Field Guide Vol 2 Dunsterville & Garay 1979 drawing fide;
Selbyana 7: 112 Luer 1982; Systematics of Masdevallia Vol 2 Luer 1986; Icones Orchidacearum Peruviarum Plate 288 Bennett & Christenson 1995; Venezuela; Paraiso de Orquideas Romero 1997 photo fide; Orchids of Venezuela [An illustrated field guide] Vol. 2 Ramiro and Carnevali 2000 drawing fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum XIX Systematics of Masdevallia Part 1 Luer 2000 drawing fide; Masdevallia's in Kleur Vol 1 P M Oversteegen, Eisses & A P Sijm 2001 photo fide; Orquideas Nativas del Tachira Cesar Fernandez 2003 photo fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum XXV Systematics of Masdevallia Part Five Luer 2003; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXVIII Luer 2006 as Alaticaulia navicularis; Libro Rojo de Plantas De Colombia Vol 6 Primera Parte Saenz 2007 photo fide; Orchids Masdevallia with its segregates including Dracula Zelenko 2014 photo fide;
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