Stelis alpina Luer & Hirtz 2004 SECTION Humboldtia
Photo by © Francisco Tobar and his Flickr Orchid Photo Website
Common Name The High Elevation Stelis
Flower Size .2" [5 mm]
Found in Carchi province of Ecuador in cloud forests at elevations around 3200 to 3400 meters as a small sized, cold growing, densely caespitose terrestrial with erect, stout ramicauls enveloped by a loose, tubular sheath in the middle third and 2 to 3 others at the base and carrying a single, apical, erect, coriaceous, elliptical-oblong, subacute, contracted below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the fall on 1 to 2, erect, subcongested, distichous, 7.2 to 8.4" [18 to 21 cm] long, simultaneously few flowered inflorescence arising through a spathe with an annulus below the apex of the ramicaul and has oblique, acute, much longer to just shorter than the ovary floral bracts.
CAUTION Said to be a synonym of S purpurea and most likely is but I have left them separate for now.
Synonyms
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;
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