Pleurothallis crocodiliceps Rchb. f. 1855 SUBGENUS Ancipitia SECTION Ancipitia Luer 1986
Photos by © Bogarin and The Epidendra Website
Photo by © Richard Korber.
Photo by © Federico Oviedo Brenes.
TYPE Specimen showing crocodile head lip shape with no appendages
TYPE Drawing/specimen by © Rchb.f.
to 
Common Name The Crocodile Head Pleurothallis
Flower Size 2/5" [1 cm]
Found in Chiapas state of Mexico, Guatemala, Cartago and Guanacaste provinces of Costa Rica, Chiriqui, Cocle and Veraguas provinces of Panama, Santander del Norte department of Colombia, Tungarahua and Zamora-Chinchipe provinces of Ecuador, Peru and the Federal District of Venezuela at elevations of 400 to 3000 meters as a small sized, warm to cold growing, shortly repent to loosely caespitose epiphyte with slender, erect ramicauls that are sharply ancipitous above the middle and 2 to 3 basal, tubular sheaths and another larger one just below the middle, carrying a single, apical, rigid, coriaceous, ovate, acute, rounded base, cordate, sessile leaf that blooms in the summer to a fascile of solitary, successive flowers, arising through a reclining spathe, .12" [3 mm] long, filiform, reclining, ascending to erect, successivly single, few flowered inflorescence with a single tubular, much shorter than the pedicel floral bract
In error P crocodiliceps has been in symmetry with P arietina, P nelsonii and P microchila, see Lankesteriana Wilson 2017 for the explanation of why they are separate.
Synonyms Ancipitia crocodiliceps (Rchb.f.) Luer 2004; Humboltia crocodiliceps (Rchb.f.) Kuntze 1891
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;
AOS Bulletin Vol 27 No 6 1958;
Flora de Venezuela Foldats Volumen XV Part 2 1970 not = P arietina;
Fieldiana Biology, Vol 33, 1st Supple. to the Orchids of Peru Schweinfurth 1970;
Orchids of Venezuela, An Illustrated Field Guide Vol 3 Dunsterville & Garay 1979 drawing not = P arietina;
Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol III Systematics of Pleurothallis Luer 1986;
Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol VI Systematics of Pleurothallis subgen Ancipita, Scopula and Trisetella Luer 1989 drawing not = P arietina;
Orchids Travel By Air A Pictoral Safari Mulder, Mulder-Roelfsema and Schuiteman 1990 photo fide;
Native Colombian Orchids Vol 6 COS 1998 photo fide;
Orchids of Venezuela [An illustrated field guide] Vol. 3 Ramiro and Carnevali 2000 drawing not = P arietina;
Orquideas Nativas del Tachira Cesar Fernandez 2003 photo fide;
Manual de Plantas de Costa Rica Vol 3 Hammel, Grayum, Herrera and Zamora 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 Ancipitia crocodieliceps;
Orchids of Costa Rica Vol 5 Morales 2009 photo fide; Orchids of Tropical America Meisel 2014 photo fide;
LANKESTERIANA 17(2) Wilson etal 2017 photo fide;
Vanishing Beauty, Native Costa Rican Orchids Vol 2 Lacaena to Pteroglossa Pupulin 2020 photo fide
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
