Epidendrum sanfranciscoense Hagsater, E Santiago and Medina-Tr. 2020 GROUP Sodiroi

LCDP Photo by © R. Medina T. & A. Cisneros and Icones Orchidacearum 18(1) plate 1836 2020

LATE EARLY

Common Name The San Francisco Epidendrum [A town in Putumayo department of Colombia where the type was collected]

Flower Size .6" [1.5 cm]

Found in Putumayo department of Colombia wet montane cloud forests at elevations around 2300 meters as a large sized, cold growing caespitose epiphyte with simple, canelike, terete, thin, erect, straight stems with the basal 1/3 covered by tubular, non-foliar, becoming scarious and fibrous with time sheaths and carrying 11, all along the apical 2/3's of the stem, alternate, articulate, spreading, plicate, light green, reddish purple beneath, narrowly elliptic, acute, margin entire, revolute leaves taht blooms in the late winter and early spring on a terminal, without a spathe, peduncle 2.6" [6.5 cm] long, terete, thin, straight, totally covered by 2, tubular, acuminate, partly imbricated bracts, rachis 3.4" [8.5 cm] long, terete, thin, densely papillose, paniculate, erect, laxly-many flowered, provided with 2 branches more or less 1.8" [4.5 cm] long, each raceme subtended by a .6" [1.5 cm] long bract, nearly simultaneously 40 flowered inflorescence with narrowly triangular, long acuminate, embracing, shorter than the ovary floral bracts.

"Epidendrum sanfranciscoënse the belongs to the belongs to the GROUP Sodiroi which is characterized by the tall plants with thick cane-like stems, the leaves clearly marked and thickened by the veins, the lip more or less 3-lobed, the margin erose-dentate to fimbriate, the dorsal surface of the sepals and ovary verrucose or muricate. The species is recognized by the short plants, 28.4" [72 cm] tall including the inflorescence, the petals linear-filiform, the sepals dorsally muricate and reddish purple, ventrally green to greenish brown, .38 to .392" [9.5 to 9.8 mm] long, lateral lobes of the lip rectangular-dolabriform with the lateral margin erose, and the lip with a purple splotch covering the disc including the calli. Epidendrum sodiroi (syn. E. goodspeedianum A.D.Hawkes) has taller plants, 40 to 120" [100 to 300 cm] tall, and the lip only slightly 3-lobed with the margin fimbriate. Epidendrum calothyrsus Schltr. has even taller plants to 160" [400 cm high], the lip immaculate, incipiently 3-lobed with the lateral lobes semi-orbicular-quadrate and the margin denticulate." Hagsater & Cisneros 2020

Synonyms

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; * Icones Orchidacearum 18(1) plate 1836 Hagsater & Santiago 2020 LCDP/photos fide;

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