Maxillaria quitensis (Rchb.f.) C.Schweinf. 1970

Plant and Flowers Photos © by Rebecca Repasky and the Atrium Diversity Information System.

Inflorescence Photo courtesy of Patricia Harding

Common Name or Meaning The Quito Maxillaria [The Capitol of Ecuador]

Flower Size 1/2" [1.25 cm]

Found in Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia in wet montane forests at elevations of 800 to 1950 meters as a miniature to small sized, hot to cool growing, trailing epiphyte with a branching rhizome giving rise to a to 12" [30 cm] long, branching stem completely enveloped by imbricating, scarious sheaths below and above by imbricating, distichous, basally clasping, ovate-lanceolate, articulated, acute to obtuse leaves that blooms in the spring on a fasciculate, 1 to 3 flowered inflorescence arising from the axils of the upper leaves and having imbricating, lanceolate floral bracts that with the imbricate bracts on the inflorescence surround and conceal the ovary and pedicel.

Synonyms *Ornithidium quitense Rchb.f. 1876

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Fieldiana Biology, Vol 33, 1st Supple. to the Orchids of Peru Schweinfurth 1970; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum Plate 543 Dodson 1989 drawing fide; Icones Orchidacearum Peruviarum Plate 322 Bennett & Christenson 1995 drawing fide; Las Orquideas del Peru Bezverhov 2011 photo ok

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