Habenaria ciliosa Lindl. 1840 Photo by © Rod & Rachel Saunders and The Ecoport WebSite

Drawing Drawing by © Harry Bolus and The Swiss Orchid Foundation at the Jany Renz Herbaria WebSite

Common Name The Hairy Habenaria

Flower Size .6" [1.5 cm]

Found in eastern Cape Province and Natal South Africa in marshy grasslands at elevations of 700 to 2000 meters as a slender to fairly robust, small to medium sized, cold growing terrestrial with basal leaf sheaths conspicuously horizontally barred with black and above, becoming suberect, linear to narrowly lanceolate to broadly lanceolate, acute, cauline leaves that blooms in the summer on an erect, terminal, lax to dense, many flowered inflorescence with lanceolate, acuminate hispid margin floral bracts and carrying green flowers

Fairly similar to H laevigata in most respects but differs in the the smooth hairless flowers and the clear green basal sheaths.

Both H ciliosa and H pseudociliosa have distinctly hispid sepals and bracts and strongly barred basal leaf sheaths but H ciliosa differs in the shorter spur, .4" [1 cm] long, subequal to the ovary and the side lobes of the lip longer than the midlobe and the rostellum arms that are simple.

Synonyms

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Encyclopedia of Cultivated Orchids Hawkes 1965; Wild Orchids of Southern Africa Stewart, Linder, Schelpe and Hall 1982 photo good; Orchids of Southern Africa Linder & Kurzweil 1999 photo fide; The Cape Orchids Vol 1 Litlved and Johnson 2012;

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