Stelis spathulata Poepp. & Endl. 1836 SECTION Stelis
Photo by S Manning
Drawing by Carl Luer
Original Drawings by © Padre Pedro Ortiz Conserved at the Herbario de la Universidad Javeriana, Bogota Colombia
Common Name The Spathulate Stelis [refers to the leaves]
Flower Size .1" [2 mm]
Found in Alajuela, Cartago, Heridia, Limon and San Jose provinces of Costa Rica, Panama, Disticto Federal, Lara and Merida states of Venezuela, Colombia, Carchi, Imbabura, Pichincha, Cotopaxi, Pastaza, Guayas, Morona-Santiago and El Oro provinces of Ecuador and Huanuco department of Peru in montane forests at elevations around 1500 to 2000 meters as a miniature sized, cool growing, densely caespitose-fasciculate epiphtye with a very short rhizome giving rise to approximate, erect ramicauls enveloped by 2 to 3, adpressed, tubular sheaths the uppermost slightly dilated and carrying a single, apical, narrolwy elliptic-spathulate, coriaceous, rugose, coriaceous, obtuse a asymetrically tridenticulate, attenuate below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms at most any time of the year on 1 to 2 , arising through a spathe, as long or just shorter than the leaf, racemose, erect, floriferous almost to the base, inflorescence with large, cucullate-navicular, acute, semi-imbricate, much longer than the ovary floral bracts that envelop most of the pedicel and ovary and carrying greenish white, glabrous to more or less cellular-glandular near the apices flowers.
"Vegitatively variable in size but charracterized by the densely fasciculated, more or less ascending ramicauls with narrowly obovate to elliptical leaves and a sl;ender raceme often slightly longer. The tiny flwoers are subtended by proportionally long, imbricating floral bracts that contain the pedicel, ovary and the lower half of the flowers. The sepals are acute with the laterals more or less parellel. The petals are single veined and truncate at the thickened apex. The type "B" lip is tridentate with a ponted middle lobe. The apex of the moddified type "B" lip of S hymenantha is merely an acute triangle. and has shorter floral bracts that do not engulf the sepals." Luer 2009
Synonyms Stelis tricuspis Schltr. 1907
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;
* Nov. Gen. Sp. Pl. 1: 46 Poepp & Endl. 1836;
Bonplandia j.2:22 Rchb.f 1854 ;
Repert. Spec. Nov. Regni Veg. 3: 276 Schlechter 1907 as S tricuspis;
Repert. Sp. Nov. Regni. Veg. Beih. 19: 20. Costa Rica Schlechter 1923 as S tricuspis;
Repert. Sp. Nov. Regni. Veg. Beih. 19: 98. Costa Rica Schlechter 1923 as S tricuspis;
Repert. Sp. Nov. Regni. Veg. Beih. 19: 176. Costa Rica Schlechter 1923 as S tricuspis;
Orchids of Peru Vol 1 Schweinfurth 1958;
AOS Bulletin Vol 30 No 5 1961 drawing plant only;
Flora de Venezuela, Vol XV Parte 2 Foldats 1970 drawing ok;
Venezuelan Orchids Illustrated Vol 5 Dunsterville & Garay 1972 drawing fide;
Orchids of Venezuela, An Illustrated Field Guide Vol 3 Dunsterville & Garay 1979 drawing fide;
Icones Planetarum Tropicarum Plate 332 Dodson 1980 drawing fide;
Orchids of Venezuela [An illustrated field guide] Vol. 3 Ramiro and Carnevali 2000 drawing fide;
Manual de Plantas de Costa Rica Vol 3 Hammel, Grayum, Herrera and Zamora 2003;
Native Ecuadorian Orchids Vol 5 Dodson 2004 photo ok;
Orquideas de la Serrania del Baudo Misas Urreta 2006 as S aff tricuspis drawing/photo hmm;
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 good;
An Illustrated Field Guide to the Orchids of the Yotoco Forest Reserve Colombia Kolanowska, Escobar, Sanchez & Szlachetko 2011 drawing good/photo ok;
Harvard Pap. Bot. 23: 172 Luer & Escobar 2018 drawing fide;
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
