Dracula insolita Luer & R.Escobar 1989 SUBGENUS Dracula SECTION Dodsonia Luer 1978

Photo by © Eric Hunt

TYPE Drawing

TYPE Drawing by © Carl Luer

Common Name The Strange Dracula [refers to the erect inflorescence]

Flower Size 1" x 4" [2.5 x 10 cm]

Found in Valle de Cauca department of Colombia in the department of Valle de Cauca in cloud forests at elevations around 1800 to 1900 meters as a small sized, cool growing epiphytc species with erect, stout ramicauls enveloped basally by 2 to 3 loose, tubular sheaths and carrying a single, apical, erect, thinly coriaceous, carinate, narrowly elliptic, acute, gradually narrowing below into the conduplicate, indistinct petiolate base leaf and is one of the few Dracula with an erect inflorescence occuring in the winter and spring that is slender, arising from low on the ramicaul and carrying a few distant bracts, 2" [5 cm] long, 2 to 3, successively single, few flowered inflorescence with shorter than the pedicel floral bracts.

"The drooping, half open flowres borne by an erect peduncle are green but covered within by numerous, tiny, raised dots. The petals are very small. The lip is very thick and pyriform in shape. The poorly defined epipchile is essentially featureless except for some very indistinct grooves suggesting faint marking s of vestigal lamellae. Most unusual is the elongate, free extension of the column foot, reminiscent of the foot seen in the geus Masdevallia." Luer 1993

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Thesaurus Dracularum Vol 4 Luer, Escobar and Dalstroem 1991 watercolor/drawing fide; Native Colombian Orchids Vol 1 COS 1990 photo fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum X Systematics of Dracula Luer 1993 drawing fide; Libro Rojo de Plantas De Colombia Vol 6 Primera Parte Saenz 2007 photo fide; Orchids, A Colombian Treasure Vol 1 Ortiz & Uribe 2014 drawing/photo fide; Orchids: Masdevallia and its Segregates Zelenko 2014 photo fide

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