Dracula venefica Luer & R. Escobar 1981 SUBGENUS Dracula SECTION Dracula SUBSECTION Dracula SERIES Parviflorae
Photo by © Eric Hunt
Photo by © Milan Vagner
TYPE Drawing by © Carl Luer
Common Name The Poisonous Dracula
Flower Size 3.2" x 6" [8 x 15 cm]
Found in Colombia and Ecuador at elevations around 1600 meters as a small sized, cool growing epiphyte with stout, erect ramicauls enveloped basally by 2 to 3, loose, tubular sheaths and carrying a single, apical, erect, thinly coriaceous, carinate, narrowly obovate, acute, gradually narrowing below into the conduplicate, indistinct, subpetiolate base leaf that blooms in the winter and spring on an ascending, arising from low on the ramicaul, sparsely bracted, 3.2 to 4.2" [8 to 11 cm] long, loose, successively single, few flowered, racemose inflorescence with a tubular, shorter to as long as the pedicel floral bract.
"Most likely a sponatneous hybrid in the open nurseries of Colombia. Because this taxon is characterized by a coarse pubescence and an inflexible lip, !Dracula chimaera is likely one of the parents." Luer 1993
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; * Orquideologia Vol 15 #1 Luer & Escobar 1981 photo/drawing fide; Thesaurus Dracularum Vol 5 Luer, Escobar and Dalstroem 1992 watercolor/drawing fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum X Systematics of Dracula Luer 1993 drawing fide; AOS Bulletin Vol 65 No 12 1996 photo fide; Orchid Digest Vol 61 #4 1997 photo fide; Libro Rojo de Plantas De Colombia Vol 6 Primera Parte Saenz 2007; Draculas Del Ecuador Pupulin, Merino and Medina 2009 photo fide; Mille et Une Mini Orchideees Roguenant 2009 photo fide; Orchids Masdevallia with its segregates including Dracula Zelenko 2014 photo fide; Orchids, A Colombian Treasure Vol 1 Ortiz & Uribe 2014 drawing/photo fide;
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