Stelis triplaris Luer & R.Escobar 2017 SECTION Stelis

TYPE Drawing by Carl Luer

Common Name The Three Fold Stelis {refers to the three, acutely ovate sepals]

Flower Size .24" [6 mm]

Found in Norte de Santander department of Colombia at elevations around 2750 meters as a mini-miniature sized, cold growing, densely caespitose epiphyte with erect, slender ramicauls enveloped by a tubular, sheath in the middle third and another 2 below and at the base and carrying a single, apical, erect, coriaceous, elliptical, subacute, cuneate below into the slender base leaf that blooms in the spring on 1 to 2, , arising from a node near the apex of the ramicaul, peduncle 1.2 to 2.4" [3 to 6cm] long, rachis 3.6 to 5.2" [9 to 13 cm] long, erect, sublax, secund, mostly simultaneously many flowered inflorescence with oblique, inflated, just shorter than the ovary floral bracts and carrying light green, externally, gray within, purple at the base flowers with a purple central apparatus.

"This small, densely caespitose species is characterized by a subacute, elliptical leaf surpassed by a sublax, secund raceme of flowers with expanded, narrowly ovate, acute sepals. The petals are single-veined, and the small, convex, subquadrate lip is a variation of type C." Luer & Escobar 2017

Synonyms

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;

*Harvard Pap. Bot. 22: 58 Luer & Escobar 2017 drawing fide

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------