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Epiphytic or rarely terrestrial herbs or shrubs; stems erect or ascending, 0.1-1 m tall, reddish, hirsute, branches few. Leaves usually subequal, rarely strongly unequal, elliptic or obovate, 4-15 cm long, 1.5-6.0 cm wide, membranous, the apex acute to acuminate, the base cuneate, oblique, serrulate or crenulate, above dark green, pilose, below dark red, pilose; petioles to 3 cm long, green, pilose. Inflorescences axillary, 1-7 flowers in a fascicle; peduncles lacking; bracts lanceolate, 5-8 mm long; pedicels 3-10 mm long, reddish hirsute. Flowers with the calyx lobes distinct, nearly equal, oblanceolate or oblong, 1.0-1.8 cm long, FIGURE 8. Columnea billbergiana Beurl. Habit (X4/). [After Skog & Folsom 4167 (US).] ca. 5 mm wide, acute and serrulate at the apex, red or orange, densely pilose; corolla orange yellow or yellow with reddish hairs, erect in the calyx, the tube 1.5-2.0 cm long, gibbous at the base, nearly straight, not ventricose, the outside pilose, the inside glabrous, the limb more or less erect, triangular, 3-4 mm long; stamens included, the filaments equalling the corolla tube, glabrous, the anthers sub-orbicular, coherent in pairs; disc of one large entire or bibbed gland; ovary ovoid, pubescent, the style glabrous, the stigma bibbed. Fruit ovoid to globose, ca. 1 cm across, white, sparsely pilose; seeds oblong, ca. 0.5 mm. long, striate, light brown, shiny, the white funicle attached at base.
