Pleurothallis helenae Fawc. & Rendle 1909 SUBGENUS Specklinia SECTION Muscariae Luer 1986
Photo by © Mikael Karlbom and his Flickr Orchid Photo Website
Drawing by © Hagen Stenzel and Systematics and evolution of the genus Pleurothallis R. Br. (Orchidaceae) in the Greater Antilles
Common Name Helen's Pleurothallis [Mrs Helen Wood English Plant Illustrator later 1800's - early 1900-'s]
Flower Size .1" [2 mm]
Found in Cuba, Haiti, Dominican Republic and Jamaica on twigs or rocks in mosses and lichens; prefers humid and partially open places like foggy mountain crests in elfin forests from 1000 to 1300 meters as a mini-miniature sized, cool growing epiphyte or lithophyte with very short ramicauls enveloped by 2 scarious, tubular sheaths and carrying a single, apical, coriaceous, green, glabrous, narrowly spathulate, acute to obtuse, tridentate, narrowly attenuate into the base leaf that blooms on a terminal, ascending, .4 to .75" [1 to 1.8 cm] long, 2 to 6 flowered inflorescence subtended by a sheath and arising through an annulus
Synonyms Muscarella helenae (Fawc. & Rendle) Luer 2006; Specklinia helenae (Fawc. & Rendle) Pridgeon & M.W.Chase 2001
References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; Flora of Jamaica Fawcett & Rendle 1910 drawing fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol III Luer 1986; Systematics and evolution of the genus Pleurothallis R. Br. (Orchidaceae) in the Greater Antilles Hagen Stenzel 2004 drawing fide; Icones Pleurothallidinarum Vol XXVIII Luer 2004 as Specklinia helenae drawing fide; Orchid Flora of the Greater Antilles Ackerman 2014; Pleurothallids Neotropical Jewels Vol 1 Karremans & Viera 2020 as Muscarella helenae photo fide
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
