Masdevallia venus Luer & Hirtz 2000 SUBGENUS Polyantha SECTION Alaticaules SUBSECTION Alaticaules [Krzl.] Luer 1986
Photo by © Lourens Grobler
TYPE Drawing by Carl Luer
Common Name The Venus Masdevallia [Goddess of Love and Beauty]
Flower Size 1.2" [3 cm]
Found in southeastern Ecuador without locational data at elevations around 600 meters as a mini-miniature sized, warm growing, caespitose epiphyte with stout, erect ramicauls enveloped basally by a loose, tubular sheatha and carrying a single, apical, erect, coriaceous, narrowly elliptic, subacute, narrowly cuneate below into the indistinct, petiolate base leaf that blooms in the spring on a stout, arising from the base of the ramicaul with a basal tubular bract, erect, to 10.4" [26 cm] long, congested, racemose, successively single flowered inflorescence with thin, imbricating, shorter than the pedicel floral bracts.
"Distinguished by the long, stoutpeduncle and a congested, long-pedicellate, successively flowered raceme. The sepals are yellow but generously suffused with red-brown. They are connate into a shallow, gaping cup with the synsepal broadly expanded. The petals are oblong and tridentate. The hypochile of the lip is oblong, twice longer than the epichile with revolute, margins and long-apiculate apex." Luer 2000
Synonyms Alaticaulia venus (Luer & Hirtz) Luer 2006
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; * Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XX Systematics of Jostia, Andinia, Barbosella, Barbrodia & Pleurothallis subgen Antilla, Effusia and Restrepioidia Luer 2000 drawing fide; Icones Pleurothallidianrum XXI Masdevallia Part 21 Luer 2000 drawing fide; A Treasure of Masdevallia Vol 26 Luer & Dalstroem 2001 watercolors fide; Native Ecuadorian Orchids Vol 3 Dodson 2003 photo fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXVIII Luer 2006 as Alaticaulia venus; Orchidaceae Masdevallia and Affiliates Dodson & Luer 2009 as Alaticaulia venus drawing fide; Orchids Masdevallia with its segregates including Dracula Zelenko 2014 photo fide;
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