Lepanthes alticola C.Schweinf. 1942 SECTION Lepanthes SUBSECTION Lepanthes SERIES Elongatae 1993
Photos by © Alexander Hirtz
Photo by © Jean Marc Palandre and his Flickr Orchid Photo Website
TYPE Drawing by © Carl Luer and The Swiss Orchid Foundation at the JanyRenz Herbaria Website
Common Name The High Elevation Lepanthes
Flower Size .2" [5 mm]
Found in Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia at elevations around 3000 to 4000 meters as a mini-miniature sized, cold growing epiphyte with a slender, erect ramicaul enveloped by 3 to 4, shortly ciliate lepanthiform sheaths and carrying a single, apical, erect, coriaceous, narrowly elliptical, acute, narrowly cuneate below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the summer on a filiform, loose, flexuous, distichous, to 3.2" [8 cm] long, successively single, many flowered inflorescence.
"The sepals are denticulate and caudate. The lobes of the petals are triangular. Most sistinctive is the lobes of the lip that are not well developed into blades and connectives. The lobes arise directly from the mid-shaft of the column, but labellarte tissue between them forms a tiny, triangular appendix bourne along the undersurface of the column." Luer 1996
Synonyms Lepanthes dipteryx Luer & Hirtz 1987
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Lindleyana 2: 96 Luer 1987 as L dipteryx Drawing fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XIV Systematics of Draconanthes, Lepanthes subgenus Marsipanthes and subgenus Lepanthes of Ecuador Luer 1996 drawing fide; Flora of Ecuador No 88 Lepanthes and affiliates Dodson & Luer 2011 drawing fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXXI 2010 drawing fide; Phytotaxa 201 (1) 57 © Luer & Thoerle 2015 Drawing fide
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