Habenaria humilior Rchb.f. 1881

SECTION Replicatae Kranzl 1892 Photo courtesy of © Lourens Grobler

Common Name The Very Modest Habenaria

Flower Size 3/4" [2 cm]

Found in the Congo, Zaire, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Transvaal South Africa in short grasslands on porr soils at elevations of 1200 to 2400 meters over rocks as a small to large sized, warm to cool growing terrestrial with globose, ellipisoid to ovoid tubers giving rise to an erect, rather stout, leafy throughout stem carrying 7 to 13, the lowermost 2 as sheaths, the middle 4 to 7 suberect to spreading, lanceolate to linear, acute leaves and the uppermost few are adpressed to the stem as leaf-like bracts and blooms in the spring, summer and fall on a 2 to 10 " [5 to 25 cm] long, laxly to densely 6 to many flowered, racemose infloresence

Synonyms Bilabrella humilior (Rchb.f.) Szlach. & Kras-Lap.2003; Habenaria culiciflora Rendle 1895; Habenaria hochstetteriana Kraenzl. 1893; Habenaria kassneriana Kraenzl. 1929; Habenaria rehmannii Bolus 1889; Habenaria replicata Hochst. ex A.Rich.1850; Habenaria tetrapetaloides Schltr. 1895

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Flora of Tropical East Africa Part 1 Summerhayes 1968; Flora Zambesiaca Vol 11 Part 1 Pope 1995; Field Guide to the Ethiopian Orchids Demissew, Cribb & Rasmussen 2004