Catopsis oerstediana Mez

Catopsis oerstediana Mez, in DC. Monog. Phan. 9: 630. 1896
Plant 5 dm. high; leaves several in a dense subfasciculate rosette, up to 25 cm. long, not cretaceous; sheaths elliptic, about as long as the blades; blades triangular, acuminate, 45 mm. wide; scape erect; scape-bracts foliaceous, large, erect, densely imbricate; inflorescence bipinnate, thyrsiform, very dense toward the apex, 1 1 cm. long, 35 mm. in diameter; primary bracts suberect, like the scape-bracts, all but the uppermost exceeding the axillary branches; branches strict, 45 mm. long, the lower half sterile, the upper deii-sely 7-flowcred; floral bracts ovateelliptic, obtuse, about 6 mm. long, distinctly shorter than the sepals, glabrous, faintly nerved; flowers dioecious, only the pistillate known, suberect, up to 9 mm. long; sepals strongly asymmetric, broadly elliptic, obtuse, 8 mm. long, subcoriaceous, glabrous, even, yellow or yellowishgreen when dry; petals suborbicular, obtuse, white, barely exceeding the sepals; stamens much reduced in the pistillate flowers, the anthers subsagittate, minute, sterile; ovary large, stoutly ovoid.
TypB i.r>cAi.iTv: Summit of BI Vicjo, Nicaragua; erroneously stated as Costa Rira in the original ilescriplion .
Distribution: Honduras and Nicaragua.