Stelis hylophila Rchb.f. 1855 SECTION Stelis

Drawing by © Dunsterville

EARLIER

Common Name The Forest Loving Stelis [refers to the epiphytic habit]

Flower Size .16 [4mm]

Found in Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia in wet montane forests at elevations around 1400 to 3200 meters as a small sized, cool to cold growing, ascending caespitose epiphyte and occasional terrestrial with erect, slender ramicauls enveloped by a tubular sheath near the middle and 2 to 3 others about the base and carrying a single, apical, erect, coriaceous, narrowly elliptical, subacute to obtuse, cuneate below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the summer, fall and earlier winter on 1 to 3, erect, distichous, 2.8 to 6" [7 to 15 cm] long including the .2 to 1" [.5 to 2.5 cm] long peduncle, mostly simultaneously several flowered inflorescence arising through a spathe from an annulus at the the apex of the ramicaul and has oblique, acute floral bracts.

"It is characterized by an ascending-caespitose habit with slender ramicauls that may be either shorter or longer than elliptical, petiolate leaves. One to many racemes in a fascicle may be shorter or longer than the leaf. Collections with inflorescences shorter than the leaf have been identified as Stelis polybotrya Lindl. . The tiny, incompletely three-veined sepals are often recurved; the petals are thin and single-veined; and the oblong lip is longer than wide, concave below the middle with bar entire, and the protruding apex subacute." Luer & Vasquez 2018

This species is also similar to S sarae but it is but is distinguished by a much more steeply ascending habit, narrowly elliptical leaves, and a single, long, densely flowered, secund raceme. The sepals are similarly broad and obtuse, but neither recurving nor revolute. The petals and lip are similar, except that the bar of S. sarae is cleft. While the stigmatic lobes of S. hylophila are partially hidden by the margins of the clinandrium, the lobes of S. sarae are fully visible.

Synonyms Apatostelis hylophila (Rchb.f.) Garay 1979; Stelis gonzaleziana C.Schweinf. 1943; Stelis recurvula Schltr. 1921; Stelis reflexa Lindl. 1859

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;

* Bonplandia (Hannover) 3: 241 Rchb.f 1855;

Fol. Orchid. 8: 3 Lindley 1859 as S reflexa;

Revista Acad. Colomb. Ci. Exact. 5: 349 Schweinfurth 1943 as S gonzaleziana;

Orchids of Peru Vol 1 Schweinfurth 1958; Orchids of Peru Vol 1 Schweinfurth 1958 as S gonzaleziana;

Orchids of Peru Vol 1 Schweinfurth 1958 as S recurvula;

Venezuelan Orchids Illustrated Vol 4 1966 drawing fide;

Flora de Venezuela Foldats Volumen XV Part 2 1970 drawing ok;

Fieldiana Botany Vol 33 1st Supplement to the Orchids of Peru Schweinfurth 1970;

Bot. Mus. Leafl. 27: 189 Garay 1979 as Apatostelis hylophila;

Orchids of Venezuela, An Illustrated Field Guide Vol 3 Dunsterville & Garay 1979 drawing fide;

Orchids of Venezuela [An illustrated field guide] Vol. 3 Ramiro and Carnevali 2000 drawing fide;

Orchidaceae Stelis Swartz A Compendium Duque 2008 drawing good;

Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXX Lepanthes of Jamaica Stelis of Ecuador Part IV Luer 2009;

Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXX Lepanthes of Jamaica Stelis of Ecuador Part IV Luer 2009 drawing fide;

Harvard Papers in Botany, Vol. 18, No. 2, pp. 173 to 196 MISCELLANEOUS NEW SPECIES IN THE PLEUROTHALLIDINAE (ORCHIDACEAE) Carlyle A. Luer & Lisa Thoerle 2013;

Orquideas de Farallones de Cali Galindo-Tarazona, Haelterman, Zuluaga Trochez and Sebastian Moreno 2020 photo fide;

Selbyana 32(1,2): 57 Luer & Vasquez 2018

Selbyana 32(1,2): 142 Luer & Vasquez 2018 Drawing fide

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