Selenipedium chica Rchb.f. & Warsz. 1854 Photo by © Patricia Harding

Drawing Drawing By Rchb.f

Common Name The Beautiful Selenipedium

Flower Size

Found in Panama, Choco, Cauca and Narino Colombia, Ecuador and Peru in well drained very humid areas on roadside banks and the floor of woodlands as a large to giant sized hot to warm growing terrestrial with an elongate, pubescent stem carrying longly acuminate, basally cuneate-oblong, plicate, narrowly elliptic leaves that blooms in the fall on a terminal, erect, racemose, many flowered inflorescence with a lanceolate, acute floral bract.

Natives of Panama use the fruits of this species to concoct an extract much like vanilla.

Synonyms

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; *Xenia Orchidaceae Rchb.f 1854 drawing; Flora Brasilica Vol XII I Hoehne 1940 drawing fide; AOS Bulletin Vol 28 No 5 1959; Encyclopedia of Cultivated Orchids Hawkes 1965 drawing fide; Die Orchideen #3 9-12 tafel 4 Rudolph Schlechter 1971 drawing fide; AOS Bulletin Vol 47 No 6 1978; Phylogeny and Classification of the Orchid Family Dressler 1993 photo fide; Native Colombian Orchids Vol 6 COS 1998 drawing/photo fide; Libro Rojo de Plantas De Colombia Vol 6 Primera Parte Saenz 2007

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------