Epidendrum ochrochlorum Barb.Rodr.1881 GROUP Arbuscula SUBGROUP Incomptum

Photo by © Cassio Van der Berg Courtesy of © Dalton Holland Baptista and Orchidstudium

Full shade Cool LATESummer EARLYFall

Common Name The Ochre-Green Epidendrum

Flower Size .8" [2 cm]

Found in southeastern Brazil in low scrub forests on wind swept mountain ridges at elevations around 1500 meters as a small to medium sized, cool growing epiphyte with an erect, woody, cane-like stem carrying alternate, lanceolate, dark green, keeled, deciduous, leaves that blooms in the late summer and early fall on a terminal, racemose to paniculate, short, 7 to 12 flowered inflorescence.

Often cited as a synonym of E proligerum but I have left it separate because of my Brazilian friends insistence that it is a separate species.

"Epidendrum ochrochlorum is part of GROUP Arbuscula SUBGROUP Incomptum which is characterized by the erect habit with successive lateral growths produced from the middle of the previous growth, few leaves aggregate towards the apex of the stems, roots produced generally only from the base of the primordial stem, inflorescences are short with fleshy yellowish to green to violet-green to black flowers with short ovaries, the lip entire to 3-lobed. The species is from Brazil and is much smaller overall than the compartive species listed below, the sepals are .36" [9 mm] long. E prietoi has a two-winged peduncle, dirty yellow flowers with purplish veins, the 3-lobed, lip with the lateral lobes dolabriform, the basal margin concave, and the distal margin convex, 1-veined petals and long, narrow calli, the disc with 3 low, narrow veins, the lateral ones trifíd, and the ovary somewhat inflated ventrally towards the apical half. Epidendrum homoion Hágsater & Dodson, from the Amazon side of the Andes in Ecuador has wider floral segments, the lip .56 to .64" x 1.04 to 1.12" [14 to 6 x 26 to 28 mm], 3-veined petals, and a straight column. Epidendrum yambalense Hágsater & Dodson , has narrower and more acute segments, with the midlobe of the lip apiculate. Epidendrum oenochromum Hágsater & Dodson has fleshy, thickened, burgundy-red colored floral segments, suborbicular lateral lohes of the lip, and oblong, 3 to 4 veined petals. Epidendrum tamaense Foldats is similarly colored buff to olive-green with purple veining on the lip, but the flowers are larger, sepals .6 to .84" [15 to 21] mm long." Adapted from E prietoi Icones Plate 779 Hagsater etal 2004

Synonyms

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI Orchidaceae Brasilense Band 1 Pabst & Dungs 1975 drawing fide; Orchids of the High Mountain Atlantic Rainforest in SE Brazil Warren & Miller 1994; Icones Orchidacearum 7 Plate 779 Hagsater and Sanchez 2004 see recognition section; The Organ Mountain Range Its History and its Orchids Miller, Warren, Miller & Seehawer 2008 drawing/photo fide; Icones Orchidacearum 15 [1] Plate 1506 Hagsater & Sanchez 2015 see recognition section;

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