Stelis saccata Luer & Hirtz 2002 SECTION Humboldtia
Photo by Spiro K and The Greek Orchid Society Website
TYPE Drawing by Carl Luer
LATE 
EARLY 
Common Name The Bag Shaped Stelis
Flower Size .2" [5 mm]
Found in Carchi province of Ecuador at elevations around 3000 to 3400 meters as a miniature to small sized, cold growing, caespitose and prolific epiphyte or terrestrial on roadbanks with erect, stout ramicauls enveloped by a 2 to 3, loose, tubular sheaths and carrying a single, apical, erect, coriaceous, elliptical, subacute, cuneate below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the late summer and early fall on an erect, arising through a spathe from an annulus below the apex of the ramicaul, congested, secund, 10 to 15.2" [25 to 38 cm] long including the 4" [10 cm] long peduncle, mostly suimultaneously many flowered inflorescence with oblique, acute, as long as to shorter than the pedicel floral bracts and carrying dull yellow to yellow green, glabrous flowers.
"Similar to S lamellata with a sepaline tube more or less inflated below the middle. Vegetatively characterized by the stout, relatively short ramicauls, often prolific, completely enclosed by 2, loose, tubular sheaths. A secund raceme of nemerous, simultaneous flowers far exceeds the elliptical leaves. The petals and lip are out of sight deep within the recess of the flower. The petals are flabellate and the lip is triangular with the anterior surface concave." Luer 2002
Synonyms
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;
* Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXIV A First Century of Stelis of Ecuador Luer 2002
Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXIV A First Century of Stelis of Ecuador Luer 2002 drawing fide;
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