Platystele pisifera ( Lindl. ) Luer 1977
Photo by © Andreas Kay and his Flickr Orchid Photo Website
Photo courtesy of Patricia Harding
Drawing by Carl Luer
Common Name The Pea Bearing Platystele [refers to the globular seed capsules]
Flower Size 1/5" [5 mm]
Found in Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia at elevations of 2250 to 3000 meters as a miniature sized, cold growing epiphyte with erect to suberect ramicauls enveloped basally by 2 to 3 thin, ribbed, imbricating sheaths carrying a single, apical, erect, coriacceous, elliptical-obovate, subacute to obtuse leaf that is narrowly cuneate below into the petiole and blooms in the spring and summer on an erect to suberect, 1.2 to 2.4" [3 to 6 cm] long including the .6 to 1" [1.5 to 2.5 cm] long peduncle, successively several to many flowered, subcongested, strict, racemose inflorescence arising laterally from the ramicaul and having oblique, much shorter than the pedicel floral bracts.
"Closely allied with P acicularis from Ecuador and P stonyx from Colombia and simpatric with both and distinguished by the shorter, more or less crowded, non-gflexuous inflorescence and an ovate, acute, non-channeled lip. Florally P piscifera is more similar to the smaller P oxyglossa but P piscifera is distinguished by the larger, usually more robust habit, somewhat congested, non-flexuous raceme andf minutely ciliate sepals and petals." Luer 1990
Synonyms Humboldtia pisifera [Lindl] Kuntze 1891; Platystele hypsitera Luer & R.Escobar 1983; Platystele hypsiteros Luer & Escobar 1983; *Pleurothallis pisifera Lindley 1859;
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Orquideologia Vol 16 No 1 1983 as P hypsitera drawing fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol VII Systematics of Platystele Luer 1990 drawing fide; Native Colombian Orchids Vol 6 COS 1998 photo fide; Native Ecuadorian Orchids Vol 4 Dodson 2003 drawing good;
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