Vaccinium pachyphyllum Hemsley, Biol. centr.-amer. bot. 2: 275.  1881.  Disterigma pachyphyllum (Hemsley) S. F. Blake, J. Washington Acad. Sci. 16: 365.  1926.  Type.  Costa Rica, Endres 154 (holotype, K, drawing from K type NY).

Disterigma mayanum Lundell, Wrightia 5(4): 85.  1975.  Type.  Guatemala.  Baja Verapaz:  Unión Barrios, Salama-Cobán rd, 6 Feb 1975 (fl), Lundell & Contreras 18936 (holotype, LL n.v.).

    Bushy, compact to straggly, terrestrial or epiphytic shrub, (2-)5-10(-12) dm tall;  stem terete to subterete, sometimes conspicuously ribbed and bluntly angled due to raised nodes;  twigs subterete, bluntly angled, striate, densely short-pilose to setose with ferruginous to brown hairs 0.5-1.2 mm long, or moderately to densely puberulent, glabrate.  Leaves coriaceous, ovate, elliptic, to suborbicular, 6-12(-16) x 4-7(-9) mm, base rounded, apex obtuse to rounded, margin entire, revolute near base, sometimes with a dense but short, tuft of hairs at the apex, otherwise glabrate, also with scattered, appressed, glandular fimbriae beneath to ca. 0.2 mm long, drying darker brown beneath although midrib and margin often appear paler;  obscurely 3-plinerved from base, midrib slightly impressed above and sometimes slightly raised beneath, all other venation completely obscured on both surfaces;  petiole subterete, broadly flattened above, 1-2 mm long, weakly to moderately short-pilose and this sometimes onto very base of midrib beneath.  Inflorescence of solitary flowers or 2-3 in a fascicle, surrounded at the base by a series of ovate bracts less than 1 mm long;  pedicel to 2 mm long, glabrous;  bracteoles clasping calyx to base of lobes at anthesis, broadly oblong-ovate, rounded to truncate, 1.5-4 mm long, broader than long.  Flowers 4-merous, with calyx ca. 3.3 mm long, glabrous;  hypanthium campanulate, 4-angled, ca. 1 mm long;  limb spreading, 2-3.5 mm long;  lobes erect to slightly spreading, ovate-deltate, acute, 1.3-2.5 mm long, glabrous or sparsely appressed pubescent;  sinuses acute;  corolla cylindric, 5-8 mm long and 2-4 mm diam., glabrous to sparingly appressed pilose without and rarely moderately short-pilose within, white or sometimes suffused with rose or pink, the lobes erect to horizontally spreading, deltate, acute, ca. 1 mm long;  stamen 8, about as equalling corolla but often exposed at anthesis when corolla lobes become reflexed;  filaments 2.5-4.5 mm long, moderately to densely hispidulous to appressed pilose (or villous) in distal half with whitish or hyaline hairs;  anthers 2.4-5.5 mm long;  thecae 1.2-2 mm long;  tubules 2, distinct, 1.3-3.5 mm long;  style slightly exserted, glabrous.  Berry spherical, crowned by persistent calyx limb, ca. 5 mm diam., translucent white.

    Distribution.  Mexico, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, Venezuela, and Ecuador;  primary rainforest, montane wet forest, ecotone between cloud forest and subpáramo at 660-3000 m altitude.