Disa celata Summerh. 1964 SECTION Micranthe
Photo by © Williamson
TYPE Drawing by © V S Summerhayes
LATE
EARLY 
Common Name The Partly Covered Disa [refers topthe floral bracts partly covering the flowers]
Flower Size
Found in Angola, Malawi, Zambia and Tanzania in wet boggy upland grasslands and open Uapaca woodlands on grassland verge at elevations around 1000 to 1400 meters as a medium sized, cool growing terrestrial with and erect stem enveloped by many sheathing leaves that blooms in the late spring and early summer on an erect, thin, cylindrical, 2 to 3.2" [5 to 8 cm] long, fairly lax, 7 to 12 flowered inflorescence with foliaceous, lanceolate, acute, longer than the flowers floral bracts.
" This is a species in which the large foliaceous bracts partly cover the flowers, the specific epithet being derived from this feature. Disa celata has orange or red flowers, as does D miniata but it differs from this latter species in the intermediate, narrowly cylindrical, not inflated spur of the sepals, that is more than .2" [5 mm] long, and the petal lobe that is as long as the anterior one. Most striking of these differences are with respect to the spur of the intermediate sepal. In the present species the spur arisies just below the center of the sepal, and is relatively long and slender, projecting some distance below the base of the sepal In D. miniata on the other hand the spur arisies well above the center of the sepal and is much inflated and so short that it only just projects below the base of the sepal The petaqls are also differnt, the posterior lobe overtopping the anterior lobe in D celata whereas in D miniat the posterior lobe overtopping the the opposite is true." Summerthayes 1964
Synonyms
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;
* Kew Bull. 17: 535 Summerhayes 1964 drawing fide
The Orchids of South Central Africa Williamson 1977 drawing/photo fide;
Flora Zambesiaca Vol 11 Orchidaceae Part 1 Pope 1995
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