Restrepia elegans H. Karst. 1847 Restrepia SUBGENUS Restrepia SECTION Restrepia
Photo by © Eric Hunt
Photo by Linda & Mikael Karlbom
TYPE Drawing by © Carl Luer
and EARLY
Common Name The Elegant Restrepia
Flower Size 2" [5 cm]
Found from Venezuela, Colombia and Peru in wet montane forests at elevations around 700 to 2800 meters as a miniature sized, variable in size and flower color, caespitose, warm to cold growing epiphyte with the ramicaul enveloped by large, compressed, scarious sheaths and a single, apical, ovate-elliptic, minutely tridentate leaf that blooms in the fall and early winter on an apical, arising on the back of the leaf, 2" [5 cm] long, erect to spreading, successively single, few flowered inflorescence subtended by a large, white, amplexicaul, tubular, shorter than the ovary floral bract and the flowers are held above the leaves.
"Similar to both Restrepia lansbergii but separated by the smaller flowers with an obovate synsepal and Restrepia wageneri by the small, yellow, brown striped synsepal. R elegans is characterized by the small to medium sized habit with small to medium sized flowers. The synsepal is yellowish to whitish and diffusely spotted with brown or purple, sometimes with s[ots coalescing below the middle. Basically similar to the flowers of Restrepia contorta but it has larger flowers." Luer 1996
Synonyms Restrepia antennifera subsp. erythroxantha (Rchb.f.) H.Mohr 1996; Restrepia erythroxantha Rchb.f 1850; Restrepia leopardina Rolfe 1899
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Bonplandia Rchb.f 1854; Bonplandia Rchb.f 1854 as R erythroxantha; Xenia Orchidaceae Rchb.f 1854 as R erythroxantha drawing fide; Die Orchideen Schlechter 1915; Atlas des Orchidees Cultivees Constantin 1920 drawing fide; AOS Bulletin Vol 30 No 5 1961; Venezuelan Orchids Vol 4 Dunsterville & Garay 1966 as R erythoxantha drawing = R jesupiana; Venezuelan Orchids Illustrated Vol 1 Dunsterville & Garay 1959 drawing fide; AOS Bulletin Vol 36 #9 1967; Flora de Venezuela Foldats Volumen XV Part 2 1969 drawing fide; Flora de Venezuela Foldats Volumen XV Part 2 1969 as R erythroxantha drawing = R jesupiana; AOS Bulletin Vol 47 No 7 1978 photo fide; AOS Bulletin Vol 47 No 7 1978 as R erythroxantha photo fide; Orchids of Venezuela A Field Guide Dunsterville & Garay 1979 as R aspasicensium drawing fide; Orchids of Venezuela A Field Guide Dunsterville & Garay 1979 drawing fide; Orchids of Venezuela A Field Guide Dunsterville & Garary 1979 as R erythroxantha drawing = R jesupiana; Orchids Travel By Air A Pictoral Safari Mulder, Mulder-Roelfsema and Schuiteman 1990 photo ok; The Manual Of Cultivated Orchid Species Bechtel, Cribb & Launert 1992 photo fide; Icones Orchidacearum Peruviarum Plate 367 Bennett & Christenson 1995 drawing fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol VIII Systematics of Restrepia Luer 1996 drawing fide/photo soso; Venezuela; Paraiso de Orquideas Romero 1997 photo okish; Orchids of Venezuela [An illustrated field guide] Vol. 3 Ramiro and Carnevali 2000 drawings fide; Orquideas Nativas del Tachira Cesar Fernandez 2003 photo not Orchid Species Of Peru Zelenko & Bermudez 2009 photo fide; Mille et Une Mini Orchideees Roguenant 2009 photo ok; AOS Bulletin Vol 85 #11 2016 photo fide; AOS Bulletin Vol 89 #11 2020 photo fide;
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
