Stelis vicaria Luer & R.Escobar 2018 SECTION Stelis

TYPE drawing by Carl Luer

LATER LATE

Common Name The Substituted Stelis [refers to the illustration erroneously used for S furfurecea]

Flower Size .08" [2 mm]

Found in Cauca department of Colombia at elevations around 3100 to 3500 meters as a mini-miniature to miniature sized, cold growing, caespitose epiphyte with erect, slender ramicauls enveloped by a tubular sheath below the middle and 2 others at the base and carrying a single, apical, erect, coriaceous, elliptical, subacute to obtuse, cuneate below into the petiolate base leaf that blooms in the later spring and late summer on an erect, peduncle 2.8 to 4" [7 to 10 cm] long, arising through a thin spathe from a node below the apex of the ramicaul, rachis 9.2" [23 cm] long, secund, congested, mostly simultaneoulsy many flowered inflorescence with oblique, acute, just shorter than the ovary floral bracts and carrying light green flowers with a rose colored central apparatus.

"A species with a flower similar to the flower used to illustrate Stelis furfuracea in Garay (1980), is described herewith as Stelis vicaria. Unfortunately, nothing is known about the plant from which the flower illustrated by Elmer Smith was obtained. Vegetatively, the leaves are proportionately shorter and wider than those of S. furfuracea and the apex is broadly obtuse, instead of acute. The peduncle is distinctly longer that the leaves, instead of being shorter. The sepals of Stelis vicaria are similarly narrowly ovate, but totally free of the minute particles, believed to be a kind of crystal, that are seen in the sepals of S. furfuracea. The petals are merely obovate and obtuse, instead of thick and triangular at the apex. The bar and dorsum of the lip are cleft to a minutely pubescent callus above the base." Luer 2018

Synonyms

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ;

* Harvard Pap. Bot. 23: 37 Luer & Escobar 2018 Drawing fide

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