Vanilla imperialis Kraenzl. 1896
Plant and Flower Photos courtesy of Danny Lentz ©, plant grown by the Atlanta Botanical Garden
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Common Name The Imperial Vanilla
Flower Size 6.4" [16 cm]
Found in Ghana, Ivory Coast, Sierra Leone, Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Zaire, Tanzania, Uganda and Angola at elevations around 900 to 1200 meters as a large sized, hot to warm, climbing herb with fleshy, broadly elliptic-oblong to ovate, apiculate to obtuse, dull bluish green, basally clasping leaves that blooms on an axillary, sessile, erect, densely many flowered, unbranched, to 6" [15 cm] long inflorescence with closely imbricating, ovate, obtuse to subacute bracts with successively opening single flowers that last 1 to 2 days
Synonyms Vanilla imperialis var. congolensis De Wild. 1921
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Flora of Tropical East Africa Orchidaceae Part 2 Cribb 1984; Australian Orchid Review Vol 66 No 4 2001 photo; Orchid Digest Vol 72 No 3 2008 photo
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