Maxillaria variabilis Bateman ex Lindl. 1837 Photo by © Eric Hunt and His Orchid Website

Color variation of the flower Photo courtesy of Jay Pfahl

Red Flower Form Photo courtesy of Marius Wasbauer

Plant and Flowers in situ Panama Photo by © Wilfried Löderbusch

To

Common Name The Variable Maxillaria

Flower Size to about 3/4" [1 to 1.5 cm]

Found from Mexico Guatemala, Belize, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia and Ecuador as a small sized, hot to cool growing terrestrial, lithophytic or epiphytic, solitary leafed species is found on or below trees in open or dense humid forests at elevations of 500 to 2500 meters with simple or branched rhizomes carrying subclustered, ovoid to ellipsoid pseudobulb subtended by several sheaths and carrying a single, apical, linear or linear-oblong, subcoriaceous, grass-green acute to obtuse leaf that blooms throughout the year with several scarious sheaths that carry the slender, to 2" [to 5 cm] long, single flowered inflorescence enveloped by several, thin, scarious, transluscent, lanceolate, acuminate bracts with variable colored, long-lasting flowers.

M curtipes is often given as a synonym of this species adn it is most likely correct but I have kept them separate at this time. M variabilis differs from the similar M caespitifica but it is a smaller plant with smaller green flowers, M costaricensis has green to cream colored flowers stained with red and comes from much wetter areas

Synonyms Maxillaria angustifolia Hooker 1841; Maxillaria chiriquensis Schlechter 1922; Maxillaria henchmanni Hooker 1837; Maxillaria lyoni Lindley 1845; Maxillaria panamensis Schltr. 1922; Maxillaria revoluta Kl. 1852; Maxillariella variabilis (Bateman ex Lindl.) M.A. Blanco & Carnevali 2007

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Die Orchideen der Sudamerikanischen Kordillerenstaaten II Colombia Schlechter 1920 as M angustifolia; Repert. Sp. Nov. Regni. Veg. Beih. 17: 68. Panama Schlechter 1922 as M chiriquiensis; Repert. Sp. Nov. Regni. Veg. Beih. 17: 70. Panama Schlechter 1922 as M panamensis; Repert. Sp. Nov. Regni. Veg. Beih. 19: 141. Costa Rica Schlechter 1923; AOS Bulletin Vol 27 No 6 1958; Native Orchids of Trinidad Schultes 1960; Flora de Venezuela Foldats Volumen XV Part 4 1970; AOS Bulletin Vol 48 No 5 1979; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum plate 870 Dodson 1983; AOS Bulletin Vol 54 No 1 1985 photo; Flora Novo-Galaciana Vol 16 McVaugh 1985; Fieldiana Biology, Flora Costa Ricensis Family # 39 Orchidaceae, subtribes Maxillariinae and Oncidiinae Atwood & Mora 1997; AOS Bulletin Vol 78 No 2 2009 photo

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