Pleurothallis cassidis Lindl. 1845 SUBGENUS Crocodeilanthe [Rchb.f & Warsc.]Luer 1986
Photos by © Rebecca Repasky and Atrium Orchid Collections Website
TYPE Drawing by © Carl Luer and The Swiss Orchid Foundation at the Jany Renz Herbaria Website
Common Name or Meaning The Helmut Pleurothallis [refers to the flowers helmut like shape]
Flower Size .2" [5 mm]
Found in Colombia, Ecuador and Peru in cloud forests at elevations around 2500 to 3200 meters as a small sized, cold growing, densely caespitose epiphyte to terrestrial with fasciculate, stout, erect ramicauls enveloped by a loose, tubular sheath near the middle and 2 to 3, loose, imbricating sheaths at the base and carrying a single, apical, erect, thickly coriaceous, elliptical, subacute to obtuse, cuneate below into the sessile base leaf that blooms in the spring on a few to many, arising through a foliaceous spathe and an annulus, 2.8 to 7.6" [7 to 19 cm] long, simultaneous, more or less secund, densely many flowered inflorescence with an inflated, enclosing the pedicel and ovary floral bract
Similar to P laevigata but mainly the lip of P laevigata is longer, decurved apically and the pair of calli are located below the middle, but there are intermediate forms that make a precise determination difficult.
Synonyms Crocodeilanthe cassidis (Lindl.) Luer 2004; Humboltia cassidis (Lindl.) Kuntze 1891; Humboltia palmiformis (Lindl.) Kuntze 1891; Pleurothallis langlassei Schltr. 1920; Pleurothallis palmiformis Lindl. 1859; Pleurothallis pleiostachys Schltr. 1924; Stelis cassidis (Lindl.) Pridgeon & M.W.Chase 2001
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;
* Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. 15: 384 Lindley 1845;
Fol. Orchid. 8: 3 Lindley 1859 as P palmiformis;
Revis. Gen. Pl. 2: 667 Kuntze 1891 as Humboltia cassidis;
Revis. Gen. Pl. 2: 668 Kuntze 1891 as Humboltia palmiformis; Repert. Spec. Nov. Regni Veg. Beih. 7: 105 Schlechter 1920 as P langlassei; Repert. Spec. Nov. Regni Veg. Beih. 27: 53 Schlechter 1924 as P pleiostachys;
Icones Pleurothallidianrum Vol III Systematics of Pleurothallis Luer 1986; Icones Pleurothallidianrum Vol III Systematics of Pleurothallis Luer 1986 as P palmiformis; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol III Systematics of Pleurothallis Luer 1986 as P pleiostachys; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XVI Systemics of Pleurothallis SUBGEN Crocodeilanthe, Rhynchopera and Talpinaria Luer 1998 drawing fide; Lindleyana Vol 16 No 4:261 Pridgeon & Chase 2001 as Stelis cassidis; Native Ecuadorian Orchids Vol 4 Dodson 2003 drawing fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXVI Pleurothallis subgenus Acianthera and Three Allied subgenera, A Second Century of new Species of Stelis of Ecuador, Epibator, Ophidion and Zootrophion Luer 2004 as Crocodeilanthe cassidis
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