Epidendrum witherspooniorum Hágsater & Dressler 2004 GROUP Aquaticum
TYPE Drawing by © Jimenez, Hágsater & E.Santiago and The AMO Herbario Website
LATE
EARLY 
Common Name The Witherspoons' Epidendrum [American Missouri Botanical Garden collector and wife current]
Flower Size 1.2" [3 cm]
Found in Panama in wet montane forests at elevations of around 900 meters as a small sized, warm growing epiphyte with cane-like, straight, terete, branching near the apex when mature stems and carrying 4 to 7, all along the apical half of the stem, elliptic, bilobed leaves that blooms in the later summer and early fall on a terminal, erect, distichous, racemose, occuring only once, on a mature stem, flexuous, 1.2 to 2" [3 to 5 cm] long, successively 3 to 5 flowered inflorescence with longer than the ovary, progressively shorter, perpendicular to the rachis, ovate, somewhat carinate towards the apex floral bracts.
"Epidendrum witherspooniorum belongs to the GROUP Aquaticum, which is characterized by the branching stems, distichous inflorescences, with a relatively thick peduncle, small, fleshy flowers, the lip 3-lobed and pubescent nectaries. The new species is recognized by the very fleshy, 3-lobed lip, the midlobe being very short, and the narrowly elliptic-rhombic, 3-veined petals. It is closely related to Epidendrum durum which has thiner flowers, the lateral lobes of the lip semiorbicular, and the midlobe narrowly triangular. Epidendrum carnosiflorum C. Schweinf. and Epidendrum lindae Hágsater & Dodson, also have thiner flowers, linear, 1-veined petals, and the former has a paniculate inflorescence." Hagsater etal 2004
Synonyms
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; * Icones Orchidacearum 7 Plate 798 Hagsater & Sanchez 2004 drawing fide;
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