Brachionidium tuberculatum Lindl. 1859
Photo by © Gilardo Laguna
TYPE Drawing by © Carl Luer
Common Name or Meaning The Tuberculate Brachionidium [refers to the callus of the lip]
Flower Size 1" [2.5 cm]
Found in Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia and northern Brazil at elevations around 2500 to 2900 meters as a mini-miniature sized, cold growing mostly terrestrial orchid in leaf humus or low epiphyte with an ascending rhizome giving rise to ramicauls enveloped by 3 long-mucronate sheaths that are tuberculate on the lower margins and carrying a single, apical, suberect, coriaceous, more or less purple suffused, broadly elliptical, prominently 7 to 11 veined, subacute to obtuse, broadly cuneate below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the spring and summer on an erect, arising from near the apex of the ramicaul with a bract near the middle, .4 to 1.2" [1.1 to 3 cm] long, solitary flowered inflorescence with an inflated, long-mucronate, longer than the ovary floral bract and carries a non-resupinate flower that can be yellow to light to dark purple.
"Characterized by the stout rhizome that usually grows more or less erect terrestrially. The rhizome is covered by a series of mucronate sheaths that are more or less tuberculate or fimbriate in their lower margins. The solitary purple flower with aucminate seplas and petals is held just above the leaf. The petals are microscopically but densely ciliate. The broadly cordate lip is furnished with an elevated but flat, minutely pubescent callus channeled on the front surface into a glenion." Luer 1995
Synonyms Brachionidium concolor Lindl. 1859; Brachionidium floribundum Garay 1956; Brachionidium sherringii var. typicum Stehlé 1939; Brachionidium steyermarkii Foldats 1968; Yolanda floribunda (Garay) Brieger 1976
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Venezuelan Orchids Illustrated Vol 1 Dunsterville & Garay 1959 as Brachionidium floribundum not = B tuberculatum drawing good; Flora de Venezuela Volumen 15 Parte 2 Foldats 1970 as B floribundum; Flora de Venezuela Volumen 15 Parte 2 Foldats 1970 as B steryermarkii drawing fide; ; Flora de Venezuela Volumen 15 Parte 2 Foldats 1970; Die Orchideen 3 Auflage Bd 1 Sonderabdruck aus Schlechter Lieferung 8 449 - 512 Brieger, Maatsch and Senghas 1976 as Yolanda floribunda; Orchids of Venezuela [An illustrated field guide] Vol. 1 Dunsterville and Garay 1979 as B floribundum not = B tuberculatum drawing fide; Native Ecuadorian Orchids Vol 1 Dodson 1994 drawing fide; Native Colombian Orchids Vol 5 COS 1994 photo fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XII Systematics of Brachionidium Luer 1995 drawing fide; Orchids of Venezuela [An illustrated field guide] Vol. 1 Ramiro and Carnevali 2000 drawing fide; Orchids of Bolivia Vol 1 Vasquez & Ibisch 2000 drawing fide; Orquideas Nativas del Tachira' Cesar Fernandez 2003 photo ok; Flora Of Ecuador # 76 225[2] Dodson & Luer 2005; Orquideas del Valle de Aburra Medellin Colombia Sociedad Colombiana de Orquideologia 2014 photo fide; Orchids, A Colombian Treasure Vol 1 Ortiz & Uribe 2014 drawing/photo fide
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