Trichosalpinx hirtzii Luer 1997 SUBGENUS Tubella Luer 1986

TYPE Drawing by © Carl Luer and The Epidendra Herbaria Website

EARLY

Common Name Hirtz's Trichosalpinx [Ecuadorian discoverer of species current]

Flower Size .2" [5 mm]

Found in southern Ecuador in cloud forests at elevations around 2250 meters as a mini-miniature sized, cold, pendent growing epiphyte with descending, slender ramicauls enveloped by 3 to 4, red, closely adpressed, microscopically ciliate, lepanthiform sheaths and carrying a single, apical, descending, thickly coricaeous, narrowly elliptical, fusiform, acute, cuneate below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the early summer on a loose, filiform, .4 to .6" [1 to 1.5 cm] long including the .32 to .4" [.8 to 1 cm] long peduncle, successively 2 to 3 flowered inflorescence arising from near the apex of the ramicaul.

"Distinguished by the long, flexible, pendent chains of red ramicauls and green fusiform leaves. The pendent, purple flower is produced successively in a hanging, few flowered raceme shorter than the leaf. The sepals and petals are simple but the lip is deeply trilobed. The anterior lobe is ovate, constricted at the base and cellular-granular, while the lateral lobes are obtuse and extending above the middle." Luer 1997

Synonyms Tubella hirtzii (Luer) Archila 2000

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; *Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XV Systematics of Trichosalpinx Luer 1997 drawing fide;

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