Stelis atra Lindl. 1846 SUBGENUS Stellata SECTION Disticha eliator alliance Duque 2008 Photo by Ecuagenera and their Ecuador Orchid Website

Common Name The Matte Black Stelis

Flower Size .015" [3mm]

Found in Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia in rainforests at elevations around 2000 to 2800 meters as a miniature to small sized, cool to cold growing epiphyte with repent, slender, distant stems enveloped by 2 to 4 tubular sheaths and carrying a single, apical, erect, coriaceous, elliptic-oblong, subacute, tridenticulate, gradually narrowing below into the short, canaliculate, petiolate base leaf that blooms on an [rerely more than one] erect, 3" [7.5 cm] long, many flowered, racemose inflorescnece arising from a small sheath at the leaf base and slightly shorter to just longer than the leaf.

Synonyms Stelis hallii var. atra (Lindl.) Garay & C.Schweinf. 1970

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Venezuelan Orchids Illustrated Vol 4 Dunsterville & Garay 1966 drawing hmm; Flora de Venezuela Volumen 15 Parte 2 Foldats 1970 drawing hmm; Orchids of Peru First Supplement Schweinfurth 1970 as S hallii var atra; Orchids of Venezuela, An Illustrated Field Guide Vol 3 Dunsterville & Garay 1979 drawing hmm; Orchids of Venezuela [An illustrated field guide] Vol. 3 Ramiro and Carnevali 2000 drawing hmm; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXIX Luer 2007; Orchidaceae Stelis Swartz, Compendium Duque 2008 MAYBE, color wrong

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