Macradenia lutescens R. Br. 1822

Plant and Inflorescence Photo courtesy of Patricia Harding

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Common Name or Meaning The Yellowish Macradenia

Flower Size 7/9" [1.75 cm]

Found in Florida, Bahamas, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Trinidad & Tobago, French Guiana Surinam, Guyana, Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Brazil at elevations of 220 to 450 meters as a small sized, hot to warm growing epiphyte in wet montane forests and tropical rainforests with elongate, subterete, slightly sulcate pseudobulbs subtended by whitish sheaths with a single apical, thin, rigid, carinate, elliptic-lanceolate leaf that blooms on a basal, pendulous, to 6 3/4" [127 cm] long, racemose, many flowered inflorescence arising on a mature pseudobulb in the summer and early fall.

Synonyms Macradenia surinamensis Rchb. f. & Wullschl. 1863; Macradenia triandra Lindl. 1835; Rhynchadenia cubensis A. Rich. 1835

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Symbolae Antillanae Vol VI Orchidaceae Urban 1909; AOS Bulletin Vol 26 No 5 1957 Drawing as M triandra; Native Orchids of Trinidad Schultes 1960; Venezuelan Orchids Vol 2 Dunsterville & Garay 1961; Flora de Venezuela Foldats Volumen XV Part 5 1970; AOS Bulletin Vol 54 No 4 1985 photo; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum plate 513 Dodson 1989; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum Series II Orchids of Peru Plate 0096 Dodson & Bennett 1989; Native Colombian Orchids Vol 2 COS 1991; AOS Bulletin Vol 61 No 10 1992 drawing; Icones Orchidacearum Peruviarum Plate 283 Bennett & Christenson 1995; AOS Bulletin Vol 66 No 11 1997 drawing; Native Ecuadorian Orchids Vol 3 COS 2002; Orchid Species Culture: Oncidium/Odontoglossum Alliance Bakers 2006

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