Species library › Masdevallia › Masdevallia mariposa
Orchids Little published: much of this is inferred from related species

Masdevallia mariposa

Masdevallia mariposa is a recently described Ecuadorian species (Doucette, Portilla and Merino, 2015) with no georeferenced wild records. Like most Ecuadorian Masdevallia it is best treated as an intermediate-to-cool cloud-forest epiphyte; the profile uses a regional climate proxy on the eastern Andean slope.

At home, aim for
Day IntermediateTargets in Plantistry
Night Close to the dayTargets in Plantistry
Humidity Humid airBand in Plantistry
Light Dappled lightDLI and PPFD in Plantistry
No rest periodGrows on trees (epiphyte)

Where it grows wild

Presumed epiphyte of humid montane forest in the Ecuadorian Andes, on mossy branches in bright shade.

No recorded elevations; the proxy site sits at about 1200 m on the eastern slope, likely at the warm end of its true range.

Ecuador

🔒 Growing it like that

The wild conditions above, turned into targets for a shelf, a tent or a greenhouse. The full profile has:

✓ Day and night temperature targets, and the limits it tolerates
✓ Humidity band, and how to hold it
✓ Light as DLI and PPFD for a grow light
✓ Wet and dry seasons, and whether to rest it
✓ Substrate and airflow
✓ A step-by-step setup to grow it like the wild

Grow Masdevallia mariposa? Add it to a free garden and its full profile opens. Pro opens all 38,374 profiles in the library, plants and fungi.

Profiles are drafts built from measured range and climate and from published sources; each section carries its own confidence in the app.