Platystele gaileana Luer & Endara 2004

Drawing by Carl Luer and The Swiss Orchid Foundation at the Jany Renz Herbaria Website

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Common Name or Meaning Gail's Platystele [American Orchid enthusiast current]

Flower Size .8" [2 cm]

Found in Imbabura province of Ecuador in wet montane forests at elevations around 2445 meters as a mini-miniature sized, cold growing, caespitose epiphyte with erect, slender, ramicauls enveloped by a thin tubular sheath and another at the base and carrying a single, apical, coriaceous, elliptical-obovate, subacute to obtuse leaf that is narrowed below into the petiolate base and blooms in the late winter and early spring on a loose, arising laterally from high on the ramicaul ,distichous, flexuous, 2.8" [7 cm] long including the 1.2" [ 3 cm] long peduncle, successively 1 to 2, 6 to 8 flowered, racemose inflorescence with acute, much shorter than the pedicel floral bracts.

"Closely allied to P delhierroi but the petals of P gaileana are minutely ciliate. The floral parts are intense purple instead of yellow orange in P delheirroi. The lips are similar but P gaileana has a lip that is longer and narrower." Luer 2004

Synonyms

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; * Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XVI 2004 drawing fide;

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