Pleurothallis herpestes Luer 1979 SUBGENUS Specklinia SECTION Muscariae Luer 1986
Photo by © Daniel and his Flickr Orchid Photo Website
Photo by © Joel McNeil and his P-base Orchid Website
TYPE Drawing by © Carl Luer
LATE
EARLY 
Common Name The Creeping Snake Pleurothallis [refers to the inflorescence]
Flower Size .12" [3 mm]
Found in Cartago province of Costa Rica in montane forests at elevations of 1200 to 1900 meters as a mini-miniature sized, warm to cool growing, caespitose epiphyte with slender, erect ramicauls enveloped by 2, thin, tubular sheaths and carrying a single, apical, erect, coriaceous, narrowly obovate, obtuse, narrowly cuneate below into the indistinct subpetiolate base leaf that blooms in the late summer and early fall on a filiform, arising laterally from the ramicaul, horizontal, more or less creeping, to 1.6" [4 cm] long, loose, successively few flowered inflorescence with as long as the pedicel floral bracts.
"Distinguished by the lax, creeping raceme of successive flowers that resemble an insect or spider crawling through the loose substrate. The spotted sepals are long-acuminate with the tails of the lateral sepals and petals curing upward. The lip is long-ciliate with a pair of small, hook-like lobes below the middle." Luer 2006
Synonyms Andreettaea herpestes (Luer) A.Doucette First published in Internet Orchid Sp. Photo Encycl. Nomencl. Notes 8(1):5 2022 ; Muscarella herpestes (Luer) Luer 2006; Specklinia herpestes (Luer) Pridgeon & M.W.Chase 2001
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;
* Selbyana 5(2): 167–168. Luer 1979;
Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol III Systematics of Pleurothallis Luer 1986;
Lindleyana 16:4 258 Pridgeon & Chase 2001 as Specklinia herpestes;
Manual de Plantas de Costa Rica Vol 3 Hammel, Grayum, Herrera and Zamora 2003;
Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXVIII A Reconsideration of Masdevallia Systematics of Specklinia Luer 2006 as Muscarella herpestes drawing fide;
Orchid Genera and Species in Guatemala Archila, Szlachchetko, Chiron, Lipinska, Mystkowska and Bertolini 2018 as Verapazia herpestes;
Pleurothallids Neotropical Jewels Vol 1 Karremans & Viera 2020 as Muscarella herpestes photo good;
Internet Orchid Sp. Photo Encycl. Nomencl. Notes 8(1):5 Doucette 2022 as Andreettaea herpestes
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