Lepanthes nycteris Luer & R. Vásquez 1983 SECTION Lepanthes SUBSECTION Lepanthes SERIES Elongatae 1993
Photo by © Eric Hunt.
Photo by © Joel McNeal
LATE 
EARLY 
Common Name or Meaning The Bat Lepanthes [refers to the resemblance of the central apparatus of the flower to the face of a star nosed bat]
Flower Size 2/5" [1 cm] wide, 1" [2.5 cm] tall
Found in Cochabamba department of Bolivia in cloud forests around 1750 meters as a mini-miniature sized, cool growing epiphyte with erect, slender ramicauls enveloped basally by 7 to 9, minutely ciliate lepanthiform sheaths and carrying a single, apical, erect, broadly elliptical to subcircular, the rounded apex minutely notched, rounded and abruptly contracted below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the later falland early winter on a filiform, loose, flexible, to 1.6 to 4" [4 to 10 cm] long, successively single, few flowered inflorescence arising on the top of the leaf.
Similar to L terborchii but the synspal of L nycteris is deeply concave and has recurved sides. The apices are terete.
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; * Phytologia 54: 357 Luer & Vasquez 1983; Orchids Travel By Air A Pictoral Safari Mulder, Mulder-Roelfsema and Schuiteman 1990 photo fide; Orchids of Bolivia Vol 1 Vasquez & Ibisch 2000 drawing/photo fide; SELBYANA Volume 22(2) 111 2001; Orchid Species of Peru Zelenko Bermudez 2009 photo fide; Icones Pleurothallidnarum Vol XXXI luer 2010 Drawing fide;
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