Pleurothallis wyvern Luer & R.Escobar 1981 SUBGENUS Acianthera [Scheidw.] Luer 1986
TYPE Drawing by © Carl Luer and The Swiss Orchid Foundation at the Jany Renz Herbaria Website
LATE 
THROUGH EARLIER 
Common Name The Broad Winged Dragon Pleurothallis [refers to the gaping flowers on the sheild-like leaf]
Flower Size .4" [1 cm]
Found in Putumayo department of southwestern Colombia and Morona-Santiago province of Ecuador in cloud forests at elevations of 2200 to 2300 meters as a small to medium sized, cold growing, caespitose epiphyte with terete at the base and gradually becoming sharply winged towards the apex, erect ramicauls enveloped evanescent basal sheaths and carrying a single, apical, erect, thinly coriaceous, elliptical-ovate, acute, acuminate, cuneate below into the decurrent base leaf that blooms in the late summer through earlier winter on a crowded, arising through a usually deciduous spathe at the apex of the secondary stem imbedded well above the base of the leaf, 1 to 1.8" [2.5 to 4.5 cm] long peduncles, successivesly single flowered inflorescence with an infundibular, shorter than the ovary floral bract.
Characterized by the broadly winged ramicauls about as long as the thin, tapered leaves they bear, produces short racemes of grotesque flowers well above the base of the leaf. The gaping, fleshy, pubescent, dark purple flowers persent a warty tongue within." Luer 2004
Synonyms Acianthera wyvern (Luer & R.Escobar) Pridgeon & M.W.Chase 2001
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;
*Orquideologia Vol 14 #2 Luer & Escobar 1981 drawing fide;
Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol III Systematics of Pleurothallis Luer 1986;
Lindleyana Vol 16 No 4:247 Pridgeon & M.W.Chase 2001 as Acianthera wyvern;
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