Masdevallia ventricosa Schltr. 1915 SUBGENUS Nidificia Luer 2000
Photo by Ecuagenera and their Ecuador Orchid Website
Photo by © Chris Peripatus and his Masdevallia Orchid Website
Common Name or Meaning The Ventricose Masdevallia [refers to the sepaline tube]
Flower Size .4" [1 cm]
Found in central Ecuador on the western slopes of the Andes at elevations around 1450 to 2000 meters as a mini-miniature sized, cool growing epiphyte with slender, erect to suberect ramicauls enveloped basally by 2 to 3 tubular sheaths and carrying a single, apical, erect, coriaceous, elliptical, obtuse to subacute, cuneate below into the slender petiolate base leaf that blooms in the spring and fall on a suberect, slender, 2.8 to 3.6" [7 to 9 cm] long, single flowered inflorescence arising from low on the ramicaul, with a bract above the base.
Closely related to M nidifica but differs in the pure yellow flowers with much shorter, slightly thicker sepaline tails and the epichile is narrowly triangular and not ovate or flabellate.
Synonyms Buccella ventricosa (Schltr.) Luer 2006
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Native Ecuadorian Orchids Vol 3 Dodson 2002 photo ok; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXV Masdevallia Part 5 Luer 2003 drawing fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXVIII Luer 2006 as Buccella ventricosa; Orchidaceae Masdevallia and Affiliates Dodson & Luer 2009 as Buccella ventricosa photo/drawing fide;
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