Stelis scalaris Luer & R.Escobar 2017 SECTION Stelis

TYPE Drawing by © Carl Luer and Harvard Pap. Bot. 22: 104 Luer 2017

EARLY

Common Name The Ladder-Like Stelis [referring to the appearance of the ramicauls spaced along a repent rhizome]

Flower Size .24" [6 mm]

Found in Santander department of Colombia at elevations around 2600 meters as a miniature sized, cold growing, long-repent epiphyte with slender, erect ramicauls enveloped by a tubular sheath below the middle and another 2 at the base and carrying a single, apical, erect, coriaceous, elliptical, acute to subacute, cuneate below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the fall and early winter on a single, erect, arising through a slender spathe from a node below the apex of the ramicaul, peduncle .8 to 1.2" [2 to 3 cm] long, rachis 3.2 to 5.2" [8 to 13 cm] long, erect, lax, distichous, mostly simultaneously to 10 or so flowered inflorescence with oblique, acute, as long as to shorter than the ovary floral bracts and carrying purple flowers with whote pubescence.

"This species is characterized by a stout, creeping rhizome that gives rise to slender ramicauls that bear a loose raceme longer than long-petiolate leaves, and flowers similar to those of Stelis argentata Lindl. The ovate, three-veined sepals are minutely pubescent, the petals are three-veined, and the broadly obtuse, type C lip is minutely apiculate." Luer 2017

Synonyms

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;

* Harvard Pap. Bot. 22: 104 Luer 2017 Drawing fide

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