This lovely little miniature epiphyte hails from Costa Rica. I got it in a trade with a friend late this fall and it is now blooming for the first time for me. It has tiny (5 mm) flowers, in fact they are so small you almost have to photograph them to really see how beautiful the flowers really are (just wish I had a proper macro)… The second photo allows for much larger magnification – for all of you with larger screens.
Trichosalpinx (trick-oh-SAL-pinks) – the plant is far less complicated than the name by the way – is a fairly small genus closely related to Pleurothallis. The name means “a trumpet with hairs” and refers to these ribbed sheaths on the stems. I am not sure what species this is though, the abbreviation sp. (short for species) is just a common catch-all for unidentified species.
I have grown mine on the windowsill in sphagnum moss, but it will soon move into my new cool viv.
Yay!!! I love my Trichosalpinx ciliaris!
Yours looks superficially similar to mine, but I have no idea what distinguishes one species from another in this genus.
Yours looks very healthy as is, but I bet it will love the cool viv!
Thanks!! 🙂 Your ciliaris is very nice too. It does look a bit like mine, but I am not sure either quite what to look for when defining species in this genus. I think it is doing ok on the windowsill right now (obviously), but it will do better with a bit higher humidity in the viv. Everything in my warm viv is growing like mad… it is going to be fun to do the same for the cool growers.