!Comparettia falcata Poepp. & Endl. 1835 Photo by © Lourens Grobler
Plant and Flowers in situ Navarco Quindio Colombia elevations 1500 meters 5/08
Plant with seed pods ensitu, Popayan Colombia 6/07 Photos by Jay Pfahl ©
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Common Name The Sickle-Shaped Comparettia
Flower Size 1" [2.5 cm]
Found from Cuba, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, French Guiana, Venezuela Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Brazil and Venezuela as a small sized, caespitose, warm to cool growing epiphyte or occasional lithophyte from shrubs and low tree trunks or on small branches in guava trees in wet montane forests occuring at altitudes of 200 to 3000 meters with an oblong-cylindric, lightly compressed pseudobulb with an elliptic, oblong-lanceolate single leaf that blooms in the late winter to early spring to summer on a newly mature pseudobulb and has a delicate, basal, erect then arcuate, 12" or longer [30 + cm] , sometimes irregularly branched, racemose inflorescence with up to 8 flowers that are held well above the leaves.
Synonyms Comparettia cryptocera Morren 1852; Comparettia erecta Schltr. 1920; Comparettia falcata var. paulensis (Cogn.) I.Bock 1986; Comparettia paulensis Cogn. 1906; Comparettia pulchella Schltr. 1920; Comparettia rosea Lindl. 1840; Comparettia venezuelana Schltr. 1919; Ionopsis orchioides Kraenzl. 1921; Orchis pauciflora Sessé & Moç. 1894
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Symbolae Antillanae Vol VI Orchidaceae Urban 1909; Venezuelan Orchids Illustrated Vol 1 Dunsterville & Garay 1959; Flora de Venezuela Foldats Volumen XV Part 5 1970; Flora de Venezuela Foldats Volumen XV Part 5 1970 as C venezuelana; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum plate 027 Dodson 1980; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum plate 639 Dodson 1982; Las Orquedias de El Salvador Vol 3 Hamer 1983; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum Plate 1416 Atwood 1992; AOS Bulletin Vol 61 No 10 1992 drawing; Icones Orchidacearum Peruviarum plate 020 Bennett & Christenson 1993; Fieldiana Biology, Flora Costa Ricensis Family # 39 Orchidaceae, subtribes Maxillariinae and Oncidiinae Atwood & Mora 1997; Orchidaceae Antillanae Nir 2000; Icones Orchidacearum 5 & 6 Orchids Of Mexico Parts 2 & 3 Plate 542 Hagsater, Soto 2002 ; The Pictoral Encyclopedia of Oncidium Zelenko 2005; The Orchids of Cuba Llamacho & Larramendi 2005; Vanishing Beauty; Native Costa Rican Orchids Vol 1 Pupulin 2005; Orchid Species Culture: Oncidium, Bakers 2006; Orquideas de la Republica Dominicana Y Haiti Fernandez 2007
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