Brachionidium deflexum L.Jost 2004

TYPE Drawing by © Lou Jost

LATE

Common Name The Deflexed Brachionidium

Flower Size .6" [1.5 cm]

Found in Morona Santiago province of Ecuador at elevations around 2000 to 2700 meters as a mini-miniature sized, cold growing terrestrial with relatively stout, suberect ramicauls enveloped by 2, long-mucronate, pale sheaths and carrying a single, suberect, thickly coriaceous, ovate to lanceolate, acute, olive green above, purple beneath, 7 veined, rounded and contracted below in to the stout, petiolate base leaf that blooms in the late spring on a slender, suberect, arisding from near the middle of the ramicaul, peduncle to .72" [1.8 cm] long, provided with a bract near the middle, single flowered inflorescence an inflated, acxute, mucronate, envelopeing the pedicel and part of the ovary floral bract and carrying a non-resupinate flower.

"This species, with its leathery dark olive leaves flushed purple below, and with purple flowers bearing a somewhat cucullate synsepal, closely resembles B. condorense, though all parts are smaller. The lip, however, is very different, being completely deflexed at the middle, and without the long flat incurved lobes of B. condorense. The large basal callus is densely papillose. Only one plant was found in flower." Jost 2004

Synonyms

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; New Pleurothallid Orchids from the Cordillera del Condor of Ecuador Drawing fide

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