Pleurothallis diminuta Luer 1981 SUBGENUS Effusae Luer 2000
Photo courtesy of Andy's Orchids
TYPE Drawing by Carl Luer
Common Name The Small Pleurothallis
Flower Size .2" [5 mm]
Found in Loja province of Ecuador at elevations of 2400 to 2450 meters as a mini-miniature sized, cold growing, caespitose epiphyte with slender, erect ramicauls enveloped by a long tubular sheath and 2 to 3 others at the base and carrying a single, apcial, erect, coriaceous, elliptical, subacute to obtuse, cuneate below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the fall on an erect, arising through a narrow spathe at the apex of the ramicaul fascile of .2" [5 mm] long, successively single flowered inflorescence with shorter to as long as the pedicel floral bract.
"Related to P brenneri but distinguished by the small habit with elliptical, petiolate leaves borne by more or less equally long ramicauls. The flowers are produced singly and successively by short peduncles in a fascile at the base of the leaf, the sepals are glabrous, the laterals forming a mentum with the column-foot, the petals are obtuse and single veined and the lip is long-unguiculate." Luer 2000
Synonyms Effusiella diminuta Luer 2007; Specklinia diminuta (Luer) Luer 2004; Stelis diminuta (Luer) Pridgeon & M.W. Chase 2001
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;
* Phytologia 49: 204 Luer 1981 ;
Icones Pleurothallidinarum Systematics of Pleurothallis Vol 3 Luer 1986;
Lindleyana Vol 16 No 4:262 Pridgeon & M.W. Chase 2001 as Stelis diminuta;
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 Specklinia diminuta;
Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXIX A Third Century of Stelis of Ecuador Systematics of Apoda-Prorepentia Luer 2007 as Effusiella diminuta
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