Trichopilia

Common Name The Fragrant Trichopilia

Flower Size to 4.5 '' (11 cm)

Found in Cuba, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Guyana, Surinam, Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and northern Brazil in wet montane forests at elevations of 1200 to 2800 meters as a small sized, cool to cold growing epiphyte or terrestrial in leaf mold on the forest floor with clustered, almost ligulate, slightly compressed pseudobulbs carrying a single apical, oblong-ligulate, subacute, coriaceous, erect or suberect leaf that blooms in the winter on a basal, pendulous, 12" [30 cm] long, few to several [2 to 5] flowered inflorescence with pale green, spotted dark brown bracts and large, fragrant, waxy, long-lasting flowers.

Trichopilia backhousiana is similar to T fragrans but T backhousiana differs in the paler green plant, thinner texture leaves, less thick, more ancipitous, curving with age pseudobulbs and fleshier flowers, with a narrower lip and lobed near the apex instead of in the middle.

Trichopilia boliviensis and T fragrans share the trait of having lips that do not cover or obscure the top of the column.

Trochopilia steinii is similar to T fragrans but it differs in the heavier substance flower, the campanulate 4 lobed lip and the raised 3 lamellae callus at the mid point to the lip.