Epidendrum pachyrachis Ames 1923 GROUP Smaragdinum
Drawing by © Jimenez and The AMO Herbaria Website
Collection sheet and Drawing © by Ames and The Epidendra Website
to 
Mid 
Common Name The Thick Rachis Epidendrum
Flower Size 1" [2.5 cm]
Found in Mexico, Guatemala, Costa Rica and Panama in lowlands at elevations around 300 meters as a medium to giant sized, hot growing, myrmecophilus epiphyte with simple, canelike, terete, straight stems carrying 15 to 20, all along the stem, articulate, distichous, coriaceous, lanceolate to elliptic-lanceolate, acute, minutely apiculate, prominent central vein, margin entire leaves that blooms in the mid spring through summer on a terminal, erect, racemose to pluriracemose, nutant, short, peduncle, terete, straight, short, hidden by the 2 prominent, widely triangular, acuminate, amplexicaul bracts, 2.8 to 3.2" [7 to 8 cm] long, successively 9 to 18 flowered inflorescence with shorter than the ovary, widely triangular, acute to acuminate, amplexicaul floral bracts and carrying fleshy flowers.
"Epidendrum pachyrachis is a part of GROUP Smaragdinum haracterized, by the caespitose, sympodial habit the stem carrying many leaves of which the surface is parchment-like when dry, the thickened rachis and carrying small, successive, basaically green flowers. The species is recognized by the lanceolate to lanceolate-elliptic leaves, the short inflorescence, with up to 18 successive, very fleshy, green flowers, the lip transversely elliptic to reniform, with radiating thickened veins at the truncate base, and three elongate central keels, the column short and bidentate at the apex, The South American Epidendrum smaragdinum Lindl. is vegetatively very similar , and epiphytic and myrmecophilous or terrestrial, but the flowers are green, spotless, with the lip dearly 3-lobed, the midlobe entire and apiculate. The terrestrial or lithophytic Epidendrum orchidiflorum Salzm. has much taller plants, up to 100" [2.5 meters] tall, with a very long peduncle of the inflorescence, the flowers greenish with brown to purple dots, the lip clearly 3- lobed, with the midlobe deeply emarginate" Hagsater 2008
Synonyms
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; The Genus Epidendrum Ames 1936; Manual de las Plantas de Costa Rica Vol 3 Hammel, Grayum, Herrera and Zamora 2003; Icones Orchidacearum 11 Plate 1152 Hagsater & Sanchez 2008 Drawing fide; Orchid Genera and Species in Guatemala Archila, Szlachchetko, Chiron, Lipinska, Mystkowska and Bertolini 2018
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