Stelis ramificans Luer & Endara 2007 SECTION Stelis
Drawing by Carl Luer
LATE 
EARLY 
Common Name The Branching Stelis
Flower Size .12" [3 mm]
Found in Morona-Santiago province of Ecuador at elevations around 2700 meters as a miniature sized [each plantlet], cold growing, prolific epiphyte with stout, prolific ramicauls enveloped by 2 to 3 tubular sheaths and carrying a single, apical, erect, coriaceous, narrowly elliptical, acute to subacute, narrowly cuneate below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the late fall and early winter on an erect, slender, congested, distichous, 2.4 to 4" [6 to 10 cm] long including the .4" [1 cm] long peduncle, mostly simultaneously many flowered inflorescence arising through a spathe from an annulus below the apex of the ramicaul with tubular, obtuse, oblique, shorter than the ovary floral bracts and carrying pale yellow flowers.
"Characterized by a robust, scandent, proliferating habit. The rhizome is stout and branching, producing at intervals 2 to 3 ramiculs. The raceme is densely flowered with minute, elliptical, nearly free sepals; the petals are broad and three veined. The lip is type "B" with the marginal apiculum very small." Luer 2007
Synonyms
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;
Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXIX A Third Century of Stelis of Ecuador Systematics of Apoda-Prorepentia Luer 2007 drawing fide;
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