R. & P., Syst. Veg. 2, pl. 3.1798 Slender herb, mostly 1.5-2 (3) m tall, usually in clusters of 3-8 plants; stem usually less than 1 cm thick, sometimes spiraled at apex; stems, lower leaf surfaces, and inflorescence bracts usually inconspicuously puberulent. Leaves +/- sessile, mostly narrowly elliptic-obovate, acuminate at apex, narrowed to rounded or subcordate at base, all but the uppermost 10-25 (30) cm long and 3-6 (11) cm wide; midrib on upperside densely strigillose. Inflorescence 5-12 cm long, 2.5-4.5 cm wide, oblong, bluntly rounded at apex; bracts red to red-orange, obtuse at apex, 2-3.5 cm long and wide, usually puberulent, the margin thin, glabrous but opaque, only the covered part dilacerating into fibers, the callus prominent, green or yellowish; bracteole 1-1.5 cm long, reddish; flowers orange-red, 3-4 cm long, ca 1 cm wide; calyx reddish, 3-7 mm long, shallowly trilobate, the lobes obtuse; corolla lobes oblong-obovate, thin, ca 1 cm wide, red; labellum red or red-orange, oblong-obovate (when spread out), thick, slightly exceeding corolla lobes, the margins curved upward, partially enclosing stamen; stamen about as long as labellum, usually yellow at apex; style fit in slot between the 2 thecae of anther, obcordate and thickened apically; stigma rounded at apex, consisting of 2 flaps, the margins ciliate. Capsules ellipsoid to subglobose, 7-12 mm long, glabrous to densely puberulous at apex; seeds black. Croat 14868. Pollinated by hummingbirds. Mexico to the Guianas, Brazil and Bolivia; West Indies. In Panama, known from tropical moist forest in the Canal Zone, Bocas del Toro (Isla Colón), Colón), (Isla Grande), Panama, and Darien and from premontane wet forest in Chiriqui, Coclé, and Panama.