Dracula pholeodytes Luer & R. Escobar 1982 SUBGENUS Dracula SECTION Dracula SUBSECTION Dracula SERIES Grandiflorae-Parvilabiate Luer 1993
Photos by © Eric Hunt, plant grown by the San Francisco Conservatory of Flowers
Photo by © Lourens Grobler
TYPE Drawing by © Carl Luer
Common Name The Cave-Hiding Dracula [refers to the central apparatus within the deeply cupped black interior of the flower]
Flower Size 1.5" x 6" [3.75 x 15 cm]
Found in Boyaca department of Colombia in cloud forests at elevations around 2500 meters as a small sized, cold growing epiphyte with erect ramicauls enveloped basally by 2 to 3 loose, tubular sheaths and carrying a single, apical, erect, thinly coriaceous, carinate, narrowly obovate, acute, gradually narrowing below into the conduplicate, indistinct, subpetiolate base leaf that blooms in the spring and fall on a purple, sparsely bracted, horizontal to descending, arising from low on the ramicaul, 2.8" to 4.8" [7 to 12 cm] long, successively single, few flowered inflorescence with a tubular, much shorter than the pedicel floral bract.
"Similar to the cup shaped flower of Dracula benedictii but considerably larger. The spealine cup of both species is whitish to lightly suffused with purple, while the interior of the cup is purple-black. Deep within the dark cup on the back wall, the column is flanked by eye-like petals with the lip below appearing to be an obscure figure lurking within the depths." Luer 1993
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Thesaurus Dracularum Vol 4 Luer, Escobar and Dalstroem 1991 watercolor/drawing fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum X Systematics of Dracula Luer 1993 drawing fide; Native Colombian Orchids Vol 4 COS 1994 photo fide; Orchid Digest Vol 61 #4 1997 photo fide; Libro Rojo de Plantas De Colombia Vol 6 Primera Parte Saenz 2007; Orchids Masdevallia with its segregates including Dracula Zelenko 2014 photo fide; Orchids, A Colombian Treasure Vol 1 Ortiz & Uribe 2014 drawing/photo fide; AOS Bulletin Vol 85 #4 2016 photo fide;
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