!Cranichis muscosa Sw. 1788
Photo © by Prem Subrahmanyam and his The Florida Native Blog
Photo by © Mark Nir and Orchidaceae Antillianae
Drawing by © L O Williams

to
EARLY
Common Name The Moss-Loving Cranichis
Flower Size .4" [1 cm]
Found in Florida, Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Panama, Bahamas, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, Leewards, Puerto Rico, Trinidad & Tobago, Windwards, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru and Brazil in wet montane forests on damp shady banks at elevations of 200 to 2950 meters as a miniature sized, cool to hot growing terrestrial herb occuring with a basal rosette of up to 7, elliptic to ovate-elliptic, acute to subobtuse, light to medium green leaves with conduplicate petioles that blooms in the fall, winter and early spring on a terminal, erect, to 12" [30 cm] long, stout, purple-green, glabrous scape with leaf-like sheaths ending in a subdensly, many flowered inflorescence with ovate-lanceolate, acuminate, slightly shorter than the ovary floral bracts and carrying successively opening, non-resupinate, glabrous flowers.
Distinguished by the foliaceous peduncle, the glabrous ovary, the lip with a membraneous margin, the disc of the lip 3 nerved, papillose-verrucoe, the single nerved, linear-oblong petals that are minutely ciliate on the m argin, the single nerved dorsal sepal, the cucullate, concave, oblong-elliptic lip with the disc ballooned out from the base to the apical 1/3.
Synonyms Cranichis bradei Schltr. 1922;
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;
*Prodr. Veg. Ind. Occ.: 120 Sw. 1788
Gen Sp Orch: 451 Lindley 1830-38
Symbolae Antillanae Vol VI: 354 Orchidaceae Urban 1909;
Flora of Jamaica: 32 Fawcett & Rendle 1910;
Catologo Descriptivo de las Orquideas Cubanas Acuna 1938;
Anexos Mem. Inst. Butantan, Secē. Bot. 1(4): 32 Schlechter 1922 as Cranichis bradei
Flore Descriptive des Antilles Francaises H. Stehle 1939 drawing good;
Flora Brasilica Vol XII II 13-43: 131 Hoehne 1945 as C bradei
Flora Brasilica Vol XII II 13-43: Tab 77 fig 2 Hoehne 1945 as C bradei drawing good;
Flora Brasilica Vol XII II 13- 43: 128 Hoehne 1945 ;
Iconografia de Orchidaceae Do Brasil Hoehne 1949 as C bradei drawing fide;
The Orchids of Panama: 42 L.O. Williams & P Allen 1946
The Orchids of Panama: 43 L.O. Williams & P Allen 1946 drawing good;
Orchids of Guatemala and Belize: 85 Ames and Correll 1952 ;
Orchids of Guatemala and Belize: 77 fig 2 Ames and Correll 1952 drawing fide
Orchids of Peru Vol 1: 115 Schweinfurth 1958 ;
Native Orchids of Trinidad Schultes 1960;
Encyclopedia of Cultivated Orchids Hawkes 1965 drawing ok;
Venezuelan Orchids Vol 4 Dunsterville & Garay 1966 drawing fide;
Flora de Venezuela Foldats Volumen XV Part 1 1969 drawing fide;
The Native Orchids of Florida Luer 1972 drawing/photo fide;
Flora of the Lesser Antilles: 61 Garay & Sweet 1974
Flora of the Lesser Antilles: 62 fig 14 1-4 Garay & Sweet 1974 drawing fide;
Orchidaceae Brasilenses Band 1 Pabst & Dungs 1975 as C bradei drawing good;
Flora of Ecuador No 9 225[1] Garay 1978;
Orchids of Venezuela, An Illustrated Field Guide Vol 1 Dunsterville & Garay 1979 drawing fide;
Icones Planetarum Tropicarum Plate 367 Dodson 1980 drawing fide;
Field Guide to Orchids of North America Williams 1983 drawing fide;
The Manual of Cultivated Orchids Bechtel, Cribb, Launert 1992 drawing fide;
Native Ecuadorian Orchids Vol 1 Dodson 1993 drawing fide;
Field Guide to the Orchids of Costa Rica and Panama Dressler 1993;
An Orchid Flora Of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands Ackerman 1995 drawing ok;
Orchids of Jamaica Gloudon & Tobisch 1995 photo fide;
Orchids of Venezuela [An illustrated field guide] Vol. 1 Ramiro and Carnevali 2000 drawing fide;
Orchidaceae Antillanae Nir 2000 photo fide;
Genera Orchidacearum Vol 3 Orchioideae Part 2 Pridgeon, Cribb, Chase and Rasmusen 2003 drawing good;
Manual de Plantas de Costa Rica Hammel, Grayum, Herrera and Zamora 2003;
AOS Bulletin Vol 73 No 11: 862 2004 photo fide;
Flora Of Ecuador # 76 225[2] Dodson & Luer 2005;
The Orchids of Cuba Llamacho & Larramendi 2005 photo fide;
Vanishing Beauty, Native Costa Rican Orchids Vol 1 Pupulin 2005 photo good;
AOS Bulletin Vol 77 no 1: 46 2008 photo fide;
Orchid Flora of the Greater Antilles Ackerman 2014;
Orchids, A Colombian Treasure Vol 1 Ortiz & Uribe 2014 drawing fide;
Orchid Genera and Species in Guatemala Archila, Szlachchetko, Chiron, Lipinska, Mystkowska and Bertolini 2018
PeerJ 7-e7385: 45 Szlach. & Kolan. 2019 2019 drawing fide
Materials to the Orchid Flora of Colombia Vol 3: 50 Szlachetko & Kolanowska 2020 drawing fide
Materials to the Orchid Flora of Colombia Vol 3: 507-8 plate 34-41 Szlachetko & Kolanowska 2020 photos fide
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