Lepanthes profusa Luer & Hirtz 1990 SUBGENUS Lepanthes SECTION Lepanthes SUBSECTION Lepanthes SERIES Lepanthes
Photo by © Alexander Hirtz
Drawing by © Carl Luer and The Swiss Orchid Foundation at the Jany Renz Herbaria Webpage
Common Name The Profuse Lepanthes [refers to the floriferous nature of this species]
Flower Size .2" [5 mm]
Found in Meta department of Colombia, Ecuador and Bolivia in cloud forests at elevations around 2800 to 3400 meters as a small sized, cold growing epiphyte with stout, erect ramicauls enveloped by 10 to 14, glabrous, close fitting lepanthiform sheaths and carrying a single, apical, erect, coriaceous, elliptical-ovate, acute to lightly acuminate, rounded to broadly cuneate and contracted below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the summer on a racemose, congested, 2.6 to 2.8" [6.5 to 7 cm] long including the .6 to .8" [1.5 to 2 cm] long peduncle, successively single, many flowered inflorescence arising on the back of the leaf.
This species has been considered by many to be a synonym of L caudatisepala but Luer in 2012 states that there are enough differences to keep it as a separate species. L caudatisepala has flowers with smooth margined sepals and a lip with flat blades but on the other hand L profusa has denticulate margined sepals and a lip with the blades indented above the middle.
Synonyms
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXXI Luer 2010 drawing fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXXII Luer 2012 drawing fide; Orchids, A Colombian Treasure Vol 3 Ortiz & Uribe 2019; Phytotaxa 422 (3) Zambrano 2019 Drawing
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