Epidendrum diothonaeoides Schltr. 1916 GROUP Diothonea SUBGROUP Diothonea

Photo by © Eric Hunt

Drawing

Drawing by © Jimenez, Hágsater & E.Santiago and The AMO Herbario Website

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Common Name The Diothonea-Like Epidendrum

Flower Size 1.2" [3 cm]

Found in southwestern Colombia on the eastern slope of the Cordillera Central and northwestern Ecuador on the upper western slope of the Andes on roadbanks and cliffs in cloud forests and among bushes and weeds below at elevations of 1500 to 3150 meters as a medium sized, cold growing epiphyte, lithophyte or terrestrial with a branching above, cane-like, terete stem enveloped by tubular leafless sheaths and carrying numerous, almost all along the stem, coriaceous, alternate, narrowly lanceolate to linear, obtuse, unequally bilobed, basally clasping, margin entire leaves that blooms in the fall through spring on a terminal, held close to the apex, racemose, arching, simultaneously 7 to 14 flowered inflorescence with much shorter than the ovary, deltoid, acuminate floral bracts and carrying clusters of a few to several, disagreeably scented, brown to reddish brown, rarely greenish brown flowers sometimes with a white column.

"Epidendrum diothonaeoides belongs to the GROUP Diothonea SUBGROUP Diothonea which is characterized by the branching plants linear-lanceolate to oblong, apically bilobed leaves, racemose, arching-nutant inflorescence, membranaceous flowers (rarely fleshy), the entire to 3-lobed, ecallose lip with the margin erose with or without 1 to 10 thin, smooth to erose keels, the column completely to obliquely united to the lip and the anther reniform. The species has tall plants, long leaves, 2.24 to 5.72" [5.6 to 14.3 cm] long, short and lax-flowered inflorescence with fleshy flowers, sepals .72 to 1" [18 to 25 mm] long, wide, rhombic petals, reniform lip and ovary .72 to .1.4" [18 to 35 mm long. It is similar to Epidendrum allisonii Hágsater & Dodson has shorter leaves, 1 to 3.08" [2.5 to 7.7 cm] long, smaller flowers, sepals .64 to .72" [16 to 18 mm] long, and ovate petals. Epidendrum celicense Hágsater & Dodson has a dense, to about 30 flowered inflorescence, membranaceous flowers, sepals .4 to .536" [10 to 13.4 mm] long, trullate petals and ovary .52 to .68" [13 to 17 mm] long, and the lip with 5 smooth, thin keels; specimens from Azuay, previously identified as E. diothonaeoides correspond fo thls specles." Hagsater etal 2006

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum Plate 085 Dodson 1980; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum Plate 379 Dodson 1980; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum Plate 379 Dodson 1980; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum Plate 466 Dodson 1989 drawing fide; Icones Orchidacearum 4 Plate 405 Hagsater 2001 see recognition section; Native Ecuadorian Orchids Vol 2 Dodson 2001 drawing ok; Icones Orchidacearum 7 Plate 720 Hagsater and Sanchez 2004 see recognition section; Orquideologia 24: 3 Ortiz & Hagsater 2005 photo fide; Icones Orchidacearum 8 Plate 828 Hagsater 2006 drawing ok; Icones Orchidacearum Vol 8 Plate 890 Hagsater & Sanchez 2006 see recognition section;

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