Costus laevis is a very wide ranging species and occurs in many different forms with differing colors of bracts and flowers. This is similar to the form that is most common along the Pacific side of Central America which I have observed from Costa Rica, Panama and south in Colombia and Ecuador on the Pacific side of the Andes. The species is characterized by non-appendaged bracts, open labellum flowers, long leaf petiole and generally long lobed ligule. The plant observed here has atypical ligules, short and truncate with hairs at the margins. The species is under study and may well be broken up. This form is entirely different looking from the type which is from central Peru.