Bulbophyllum elegans Gardner ex Thwaites SECTION Cirrhopetalum [Lindl.] Rchb.f 1861
Photo by © Suranjan Fernando and An Anotated Checklist of the Orchids of Sri Lanka
Drawing by © M.D.Dassanayake & F.R.Fosberg
Common Name The Elegant Bulbophyllum
Flower Size .4" [1 cm] across, 1.6" [4 cm] long
Found in southwestern India and Sri Lanka in submontane and tropical wet evergreen forests at elevations of 400 to 1900 meters as a miniature sized, hot to cool growing epiphyte with a stout, creeping rhizome giving rise to ovoid, slightly bent, tapering to the apex, ridged pseudobulbs carring a single, apical, linear to linear-lanceolate, coriaceous, acute to subacute,consicuously grooved midrib, shortly petiolate base leaf that blooms in the winter and spring on a basal, slender, decurved, pendulous, to 2.6" [6.5 cm] long, 1 to rarely 2 flowered inflorescence with oblong, mucronate, papery, 7 to 9 veined floral bracts and carrying dull purple flowers with a green lip.
Synonyms Phyllorkis elegans (Gardner ex Thwaites) Kuntze 1891; Rhytionanthos elegans (Gardner ex Thwaites) C.S.Kumar & Garay 2013
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; A Revised Handbook to the Flora of Ceylon Dassanayake & Fosberg 1981 drawing fide; Orchid Digest Vol 73 #3 2009 photo not;
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