Ponthieva formosa Schltr 1923
Photos by © Canek Ledesma y Anastasio Sotero and Kew's Plant of the World Website
Common Name The Beautiful Ponthieva
Flower Size .8" [2 cm]
Found in Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, Costa Rica and Panama at elevations of 1600 to 2500 meters as a miniature to small sized, warm to cool growing epiphyte with a single large and 2 progressivley smaller, erect to erect-patent, densely pilose, lanceolate to lanceolate-elliptic, acuminate, cuneate below into the pilose, channeled, petiolate base leaf that blooms in the winter and spring an erect to ascending, terminal, peduncle .8 to 3.2" [2 to 8 cm] long, very weak, terete, densely pubescent, provided with 2, distant, clasping, acuminate sheathing bracts, rachis 3.2" [8 cm] long, successively, 2 to 9 flowered inflorescence with elliptic, shortly acuminate, pilose, much shorter than the ovary floral bracts.
Related to Ponthieva maculata but P formosa is a smaller plant with a single, large, pilose leaf and 2 progressively smaller as well as a very loose, few flowered raceme. The flowers are somewhat larger than P maculata.
Synonyms
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI Lankester's Epidendra Website CR ;
* Repert. Sp. Nov. Regni. Veg. Beih. 19: 12. Costa Rica Schlechter 1923;
Icones Planetarum Tropicarum Plate 1574 Atwood 1993 as P brenesii [not a synonym, explains why];
Manual de Plantas de Costa Rica Vol 3 Hammel, Grayum, Herrera and Zamora 2003;
Guia de Orquideas de Chiapas Carlos Rommel Beutelspacher Baigts 2013 photo fide;
Orchid Genera and Species in Guatemala Archila, Szlachchetko, Chiron, Lipinska, Mystkowska and Bertolini 2018 photo fide;
Vanishing Beauty, Native Costa Rican Orchids Vol 2 Lacaena to Pteroglossa Pupulin 2020 photo fide
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