Epidendrum × monteverdense (Pupulin & Hágsater) Hágsater 2005 GROUP Oerstedella SUBGROUP Verrucosum

Photo by © Hagsater and The The Epidendra Website

Drawing

Drawing by © Jimenez, Hágsater & E.Santiago and The AMO Herbario Website

Common Name or Meaning Monteverde Epidendrum [An orchid hotspot in Costa Rica]

Flower Size .8" [2 cm]

Found in Costa Rica in premontane and lower montane cloud forests at elevations around 1550 to 1950 meters as a small to giant sized, cool growing epiphyte with a simple, cane-like, terete, thin, erect, straight, much branched above stem carrying 7 to 25, throughout the stem, distichous, articulate, subcoriaceous, narrowly lanceolate to elliptic-lanceolate, bilobed apically leaves that blooms in the winter through summer on a terminal and lateral between the uppermost leaves, erect, terete, thin, straight, 1.6 to 3.6" [4 to 9 cm] long including the .2 to .6" [.5 to 1.5 cm] long peduncle, somewhat flexuous, racemose to somewhat paniculate, 4 to 26 flowered inflorescence with shorter than the ovary, narrowly triangular, acute to acuminate floral bracts.

This species is a natural hybrid between E endresii and Epidendrum exasperatum Rchb. f..

"Epidendrum x monteveredense belongs to the GROUP Oerstedella which is characterized by the sympodial habit, mostly verrucose stems, and the rostellum which is transverse to the column instead of parallel, forming a wide, open sinus, and SUBGROUP Verrucosum, recognized by the small to medium sized, membranaceous flowers with sepals and petals immaculate, a bilobed clinandrium hood slightly surpassing the body of the column, obovoid, subequal pollinia with long granulose caudicles. The hybrid is distinguished by the creamy yellow to pale green flowers, the lip white with a pair of violet spots, the lobes truncate, the sepals dorsally unornamented and the column with apex 4-lobed and sometimes bordered with violet at the apex. Vegetatively it is very similar to Epidendrum exasperatum Rchb. f. which has the sheaths dotted with brown, not verrucose, flowers greenish brown, the lip white somewhat tinged with violet and turning yellowish with time, the lateral lobes more or less bifid, with at least one long, acuminate, tooth, and the sepals dorsally exasperate. Epidendrum endresii Rchb.f. has small plants with unbranched stems, the leaves ovate, an apical inflorescence with white flowers, the lip and the apex of the column tinged with purple; sepals dorsally smooth, and the lateral lobes of the lip subquadrate-oblong. Epidendrum parviexasperatum (Hágsater) Hagsater has the stems covered with small warts, apical and lateral inflorescences with somewhat smaller flowers with sepals .3 to .72" [7.5 to l8 mm] long, dorsally exasperate, brown with the margins yellowish, the lip and column white somewhat tinged with violet, and the lateral lobes of the lip subquadrate. " Hagsater etal 2008

Synonyms Oerstedella × monteverdensis Pupulin & Hágsater 2003

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Lankesteriana 8: 32-36, f. 1A-F, f. 2-3, f. 4A-H, f. 5C Pupulin & Hagsater 2003 as Oerstedella monteverdensis drawing fide; *Lankesteriana 5(1): 74. Hagsater 2005 drawing/photo fide; Icones Orchidacearum Vol 8 Plate 831 Hagsater & Sanchez 2006 see recognition section; Icones Orchidacearum 9 Plate 931 Hagsater 2007 see recognition section; Icones Orchidacearum 11 plate 1145 Hagsater & Sanchez 2008 drawing fide; Vanishing Beauty, Native Costa Rican Orchids Vol 2 Lacaena to Pteroglossa Pupulin 2020 photo fide

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