Platythelys vaginata (Hook.) Garay 1977

Drawing by © Fritz Hamer and The Swiss Orchid Foundation at the Jany Renz Herbaria Website

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Common Name The Sheathed Platythelys

Flower Size .08" [2 mm]

Found in Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and Costa Rica in shady wet montane forests at elevations of 500 to 1500 meters as a miniature sized, warm to cool growing terrestrial with a decumbent stem becoming erect and carrying several, dark green, ovate, acute, abruptly narrowing below into the petiolate base leaves that blooms in the late spring through summer on an erect, terminal, short, to 1.2" [3 cm] long, many flowered inflorescence

Often cited as a synonym of P querticola but differs in the smaller weaker plant, a differently shaped lip with a less pronounced constriction between the basal and apical 3 lobed portions as well as the basal portion of the lip is larger and wider when flattened.

Synonyms Aspidogyne vaginata (Hook.) Meneguzzo 2012; *Erythrodes vaginata (Hook.) Ames 1915; Physurus humidicola Schltr. 1918; Physurus parviflorus Schltr. 1925; Physurus trilobulatus Schltr. 1918; Physurus vaginatus Hook. 1841;

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Studies in the family Orchidaceae Vol VII Ames 1922 as Erythrodes vaginata; Icones Plantarum Tropicarum Plate 1081 Hamer 1982 as Erythrodes vaginata drawing fide; Harvard Pap. Bot. 5 #2: Carnevali etal. 2001 Manual De Plants De Costa Rica Vol III Hammel, Grayum, Herrera and Zamora 2003 as Erythrodes vaginata drawing good; Orchid Genera and Species in Guatemala Archila, Szlachchetko, Chiron, Lipinska, Mystkowska and Bertolini 2018

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