Epidendrum rigidum Jacq. 1760 GROUP Rigidum Photo courtesy of Danny Lentz, plant grown by Atlanta Botanical Garden.

plant in situ in the Fahkahatchee Strand in southern Florida

Another Plant in situ in Faxcahatchee Strand in southern Florida Photo courtesy of Jay Pfahl

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Common Name Rigid Epidendrum

Flower Size to 1/2" [to 1.3 cm]

Found in Florida, Bahamas, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, Leewards, Puerto Rico, Trinidad & Tobago, Windwards, Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, French Guiana, Surinam, Guyana, Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Brazil and Argentina in tropical wet and montane forests as a medium sized, cool to hot growing epiphyte in tropical rainforests and tropical semi-deciduous forests, as well as mangrove and other lowland communities at elevations of sealevel to 1350 meters with reed-like stems enveloped basally by several, imbricate, acumionate, scarious sheaths and carrying 3 to 6, clustered at the apical half, narrowly elliptic, subcoriaceous, unequally bilobed apically and basally clasping leaves that has a terminal, short to 6" [15 cm], erect or arching, fractiflex raceme arising on mature canes that has a laterally compressed rachis with prominent conduplicate, spaced, floral bracts that are longer than the ovaries, with 2 ranked, minute successive opening flowers that appear in the spring and fall.

Synonyms Epidendrum cardiophorum Schltr. 1911; Epidendrum pium Rchb. f. 1881; Spathiger rigidus (Jacq.) Small 1913

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list IPNI ; Symbolae Antillanae Vol VI Orchidaceae Urban 1909; Repert. Sp. Nov. Regni. Veg. Beih. 19: 127. Costa Rica Schlechter 1923; Beitrage Zur Orchideenkunde Von Colombia 27:71 Schlechter 1924; Beitrage Zur Orchideenkunde Von Colombia 27:136 Schlechter 1924; AOS Bulletin Vol 26 No 10 1957; AOS Bulletin Vol 27 No 6 1958; Native Orchids of Trinidad Schultes 1960; Venezuelan Orchids Vol 4 Dunsterville & Garay 1966; Flora de Venezuela Foldats Volumen XV Part 3 1970; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum plate 095 Dodson 1980; Icones Orchidacearum I Plate 41 Hagsater and Salazar 1990; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum plate 734 Dodson 1982; AOS Bulletin Vol 54 No 3 1985 photo; Icones Orchidacearum 2 Plate 308 Hagsater 1993 see recognition section; Icones Orchidacearum 3 Plate 308 Hagsater 1999 see recognition section; Icones Orchidacearum 3 Plate 357 Hagsater 1999 see recognition section; The Orchids of Cuba Llamacho & Larramendi 2005 Orchidaceae Antillanae Nir 2000; Native Ecuadorian Orchids Vol 2 Dodson 2002; Orchids of Bolivia Vol 2 Laelinae Vasquez and Ibisch 2004; Vanishing Beauty; Native Costa Rican Orchids Vol 1 Pupulin 2005 as Epidendrum cardiophorum; Orquideas de la Serrania del Baudo Misas Urreta 2006; AOS Bulletin Vol 77 no 1 2008 photo

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