Hormidium pygmaeum (Hook.) Benth. & Hook. f. ex Hemsl. 1881 Photo by © Richard Ashby and hisOrchid Photo Website.

Plant and Flower Photo by © Jay Pfahl

Plant and Flower Photo courtesy of Eric Hunt, plant grown by OrchidMania

Plant and Flowers en situ Costa Rica Photo courtesy of Wilfried Löderbusch

and

Common Name Dwarf Hormidium

Flower Size 1/16" to 1/2" [.5 to 1 cm]

A common, hot growing, miniature, creeping epiphyte with tiny elliptic pseudobulbs that form dense mats, and is found in Florida, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, Leewards?, Puerto Rico, Trinidad & Tobago, Windwards, Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, French Guiana, Surinam, Guyana, Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia and Brazil in wet montane forests at elevations of sealevel to 1700 meters and has the smallest flowers of the genus which occur mostly in the spring, summer and fall on a terminal, very short, subsessile, subumbellate inflorescence arising on a mature, fusiform, bifoliate, dark green psuedobulb partially enveloped basally by a few scarious sheaths and carrying 2, apical, narrowly lanceolate, acute, conduplicate at the base leaves and forming an apical spathe giving rise to a terminal, subsessile, subumbellate, racemose inflorescence usually occurring with one to two flowers held close to the apex of the pseudobulb.

Synonyms Aulizeum pygmaeum (Hook.) Benth. 1892; Coelogyne triptera Brongn. 1834; Encyclia pygmaea (Hook.) Dressler 1961; Encyclia triptera (Brongn.) Dressler & G.E. Pollard 1971; Epidendrum caespitosum Poepp. & Endl. 1837-8; Epidendrum hioramii (Acuña & Roíg) Acuña & Alain 1960; Epidendrum humile Vell. 1831; Epidendrum monanthum Schltr. 1916; Epidendrum monanthum Steud. 1840; *Epidendrum pygmaeum Hook. 1833; Epidendrum uniflorum Lindl. 1839; Hormidium hioramii Acuña & Roíg 1936; Hormidium humile (Cogn.) Schltr. 1920; Hormidium tripterum (Brongn.) Cogn. 1898; Hormidium uniflorum (Lindl.) Heynh. 1841; Lanium hioramii (Acuña & Roíg) H.Dietr. 1980; Microstylis humilis Cogn. 1906; Prosthechea pygmaea (Hook.) W. E. Higgins 1997

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Symbolae Antillanae Vol VI Orchidaceae Urban 1909 as Hormidium tripterum; Flora of Jamaica Fawcett & Rendle 1910 as Hormidium tripterum drawing fide; Repert. Sp. Nov. Regni. Veg. Beih. 19: 129. Costa Rica Schlechter 1923 as H pseudopygmaeum; Repert. Sp. Nov. Regni. Veg. Beih. 19: 207. Costa Rica Schlechter 1923; Repert. Sp. Nov. Regni. Veg. Beih. 19: 207. Costa Rica Schlechter 1923 as H pseudopygmaeum; AOS Bulletin Vol 29 No 10 1960 as Epidendrum pygmaeum; Venezuelan Orchids Vol 2 Dunsterville & Garay 1961 as Epidendrum pygmaeum; Flora de Venezuela Foldats Volumen XV Part 3 1970 as Epidendrum pygmaeum; Las Orquedias De El Salvador Vol 1 Hamer 1974 as Epidendrum pseudopygmaeum drawing/photo fide; Orchids of Venezuela ; An Illustrated Field Guide Vol 1 Dunsterville & Garay 1979 as Epidendrum pygmaeum drawing fide; Las Orquedias de El Salvador Vol 3 Hamer 1981 as Epidendrum pseudopygmaeum drawing fide; AOS Bulletin Vol 48 No 5 1979 as E pseudopygmaea; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum Plate 070 Dodson 1980 as Encyclia pygmaea drawing fide; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum Plate 695 Dodson 1982 as Encyclia pygmaea drawing fide; The Orchids of Surinam Werkhoven 1986 photo ok; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum Series II plate 0215 Dodson & Vasquez 1989 as Encyclia pygmaea drawing fide; Icones Orchidacearum Peruviarum Plate 038 Bennett & Christenson 1993 as Encyclia pygmaea drawing fide; Orchids of the High Mountain Atlantic Rainforest in SE Brazil Warren & Miller 1994 as Encyclia pygnaea; An Orchid Flora Of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands Ackerman 1995 as Encyclia pygmaea drawing fide; ; Flora of the Venezuelan Guayana Vol 7 Steyermark, Berry, Yatskievych and Holst 2003; Native Ecuadorian Orchids Vol 4 Dodson 2003 drawing fide; Orquideas Nativas del Tachira Cesar Fernandez 2003 as Prosthechea pygmaea photo fide; Orchids of Bolivia Vol 2 Laelinae Vasquez and Ibisch 2004 as Protheschea pygmaea; The Cattleyas and Their Relatives, the Debateable Epidendrum Withner and Harding 2004 photo fide;Orquideas de la Serrania del Baudo Misas Urreta 2006 as Prosthechea pygmaea drawing/photo fide; Orchids of Costa Rica Vol 2 Morales 2009 as Prosthechea pygmaea photo fide; Las Orquideas del Peru Izerskyy & Bezverhov 2011 photo fide

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