Pleurothallis schizopogon Luer 1979 SUBGENUS Aenigma SECTION Aenigma Luer 1986
Photo by © Jay Pfahl
Photo by © Eric Hunt
Photo by © Esperanza Mejia
TYPE Drawing by © Carl Luer
Common Name The Split Beard Pleurothallis
Flower Size 2" [5 cm]
Found in Loja and Zamora-Chinchipe provinces of southern Ecuador and northern Peru in cloud forests at elevations of 2400 to 3100 meters as a miniature to small sized, cold growing, ascending epiphyte with an elongate rhizome giving rise to alternate, slender, ascending ramicauls enveloped basally by 1 to 2, loose, tubular sheaths and carrying a single, apical, suberect, coriaceous, narrowly obovate, obtuse to rounded appically, gradually narrows below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the winter spring and fall on an erect, arising laterally from the ramicaul, loose, 2 to 6" [5 to 15 cm] long, racemose, successively single, 3 to 6 flowered, inflorescence and has acute, oblique, shorter than the pedicel floral bracts.
"This species, the largest of the subgenus, is known from cold forests at high altitudes in southern Ecuador and northern Peru. The species is recognized by the shortly scandent habit, and a successively few flowered inflorescence of bizarre flowers recognized by the pair of hairy lateral sepals that resemble a long, white beard split into two halves." Luer 1994
Synonyms Andinia schizopogon (Luer) Pridgeon & M.W. Chase 2001
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;
* Selbyana 5: 165. Luer 1979 Drawing fide;
Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol III Systematics of Pleurothallis Luer 1986;
Lindleyana Vol 16 No 4:251 Pridgeon & M.W. Chase 2001 as Andinia schizopogon;
Native Ecuadorian Orchids Vol 4 Dodson 2003 photo fide;
Orchid Species of Peru Zelenko Bermudez 2009 photo fide;
Compendium of Miniature Orchid Species Parsons & Gerritsen 2013 as Andinia schizopogon photos fide;
Pleurothallids Neotropical Jewels Vol 1 Karremans & Viera 2020 as Andinia schizopogon photo fide
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