Epidendrum mora-retanae Hágsater 1993 GROUP Ramosum SUBGROUP Paranense
Photos by © J Sebastian Moreno and his Flickr Orchid Photo Website
TYPE Drawing by © Jimenez, Hágsater & E.Santiago and The AMO Herbario Website
MID
Common Name Mora-Retana's Epidendrum [Costa Rican Director of Lankester Garden]
Flower Size 1.2" [3 cm]
Found in Costa Rica, Panama and Colombia [the photos are all in situ from a plant encounted on Mt Farallone, Cauca department of Colombia] in tall evergreen forests at elevations of 600 to 1800 meters as a large to giant sized, warm to cool growing, hanging epiphyte with many branching, main stem and primary branches with longer leaves than the flowering branches which arise from both the main or primary branches all carrying evenly distributed throughout, subcoriaceous, narrowly lanceolate, bilobed apically leaves that blooms in the mid winter through mid spring on a terminal, on the flowering branches, distichous, occuring only once 1.6 to 2.8 [4 to 7 cm] long, peduncle, short with 3 to 5, imbricate, conduplicate bracts, simultaneously 4 to 9 flowered inflorescence with longer than the ovary, conduplicate, more or less imbricate floral bracts and carrying sweetly scented flowers.
Epidendrum mora-retanae is part of GROUP Ramosum SUBGROUP Paranense characterized by the pendent branching plant with coriaceous leaves, distichous inflorescense, oblong to oblong-lanceolate leaves. The species has large, hanging, much branching plants with subcoriaceous (not f1eshy), 4 to 4.4" [10 to 11 cm] long lanceolate leaves, and 4 to 9 flowered racemes produced in flowering branches arising from either the main stem or the primary branches, with subimbricating floral bracts and creamy-white, fragrant flowers. E. acuniae Dressler is similar, but has thicker, f1eshy leaves and 1 to 3 brownish or greenish flowers in a much smaller inflorescense. E. santaclarense Ames has green flowers, widely spaced floral bracts, and the flowers are produced in larger branches. E . paranense Barb. Rodr., from Brazil, is similar in habit but differs in the strongly imbricating floral bracts and in the floral details." Hagsater etal 1993
Synonyms
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; * Icones Orchidacearum 2 Plate 160 Hagsater & Sanchez 1993; Icones Orchidacearum 2 Plate 179 Hagsater & Dodson 1993 see recognition section; drawing fide; Field Guide to the Orchids of Costa Rica and Panama Dressler 1993; Icones Orchidacearum 3 Plate 359 Hagsater & Sanchez 1999 see recognition section; Icones Orchidacearum 4 Plate 415 Hagsater 2001 see recognition section; Icones Orchidacearum 4 Plate 462 Hagsater 2001 see recognition section; Manual de las Plantas de Costa Rica Vol 3 Hammel, Grayum, Herrera and Zamora 2003; Orchids of Costa Rica Vol 3 Morales 2009 photo fide; Orquideologia Vol 29 #1 2012 photo fide; Orchids of the Department of Valle De Cauca Colombia Vol 2 Kolanowska, Hagsater etal. 2014 photo drawing/photo fide; Orquideas, Tesoro de Colombia Vol 2 Ortiz & Uribe 2017 photo fide; Orquideas de Farallones de Cali Galindo-Tarazona, Haelterman, Zuluaga Trochez and Sebastian Moreno 2020 photo fide
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
