Lepanthes oxypetala Luer & Hirtz 1988 SECTION Lepanthes SUBSECTION Lepanthes SERIES Elongatae 1993
Photo by © Lourens Grobler
TYPE drawing by © Carl Luer
Common Name The Long-Pointed Petals Lepanthes
Flower Size .15" [3mm]
Found in Colombia and Ecuador in cloud forests at elevations of 2900 to 3500 meters as a small sized, cold growing epiphyte with erect, slender to stout ramicauls enveloped by 5 to 11, minutely ciliate lepanthiform sheaths carrying a single apical, erect, coriaceous, elliptical-oblong, obtuse, shortly acuminate, broadly cuneate contracted below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the summer and fall on to 4, slender, to 4.8" [to 12 cm] long, successively many flowered, flexible, racemose inflorescence.
"Similar to L biloba vegetatively and flowers but L oxypetala differs greatly in the petals that originate from the shaft of an elongated column above the base. The convex, pubescent blades of the lip are also similar but the connectives support the bases f the blades abd the body originate from above the middle of the column." Luer 1996
Synonyms
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Native Colombian Orchids Vol 5 COS 1994 photo 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; Orchids, A Colombian Treasure Vol 3 Ortiz & Uribe 2019 drawing/photo fide;
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