Myrmecophila brysiana (Lem.) G.C. Kenn. 1979 SUBGENUS Chaunoschomburgkia

Photo by © Jose Pestana and his Flickr Orchid Photo Website

Common Name Brys's Schomburgkia [French Gardener - First Bloomer of Species 1800's]

Flower Size 2.5" [6.25 cm]

Found in Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Colombia in low dense mangroves along rivers and seashores at elevations of sealevel to 200 meters as a large sized, hot growing epiphytic species with fusiform-conical, hollow, sulcate pseudobulbs carrying 2, very coriaceous, ovate-elliptic, retuse at the rounded apex leaves that blooms in the winter and spring on a terminal, 3' [90 cm] long, erect, paniculate inflorescence partly covered by sterile sheathing bracts and fertile, triangular, acute floral bracts with many, showy flowers.

Similar to M. tibicinis but differs in having a distinct claw at the base of the midlobe of the lip and having 3 raised or elevated veins on the disc while tibicinis has 5 to 7.

This species is often found in conjunction with ants and may benefit from their presence.

Synonyms *Schomburgkia brysiana Lem. 1851; Schomburgkia campecheana [Lem] Kraenzlin 1903

References W3 Tropicos, Kew Monocot list , IPNI ; AOS Bulletin Vol 32 # 1 1963 Drawing good; AOS Bulletin Vol 32 No 5 1963 drawing fide; Die Orchideen 3 Auflage Bd 1 Sonderabdruck aus Schlechter Lieferung 10 576 - 632 Brieger, Maatsch and Senghas 1977 photo fide; Orquideologia Vol 12 3/4 1977/8 as Schomburgkia campecheana; Icones Planetarum Tropicarum plate 1049 Dodson 1984 drawing fide; Cattleyas and Their Relatives Withner Vol 3 1990 as Schomburgkia brysiana photo fide; The Manual Of Cultivated Orchid Species Bechtel, Cribb & Launert 1992 photo fide; Guatemala Y Sus Orquideas Behar & Tinschert 1998 as Schomburgkia brysiana photo fide; Harvard Pap. Bot. 5 #2: Carnevali etal. 2001; AOS Bulletin Vol 73 No 8 2004; AOS Bulletin Vol 79 #7 2010 photo fide; AOS Bulletin Vol 82 #11 2013 photo fide; AOS Bulletin Vol 85 #9 2016 photo fide; Orchid Genera and Species in Guatemala Archila, Szlachchetko, Chiron, Lipinska, Mystkowska and Bertolini 2018 photo fide; Vanishing Beauty, Native Costa Rican Orchids Vol 2 Lacaena to Pteroglossa Pupulin 2020 photo not = M christinae

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