Platanthera leucophaea (Nutt.) Lindl. -  Eastern Prairie Fringed Orchid


 

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Platanthera leucophaea - (image 1 of 6)

 

Taxonomy

Family: Orchidaceae

Habitat

Moist to wet prairies, fens, lake shores.

Associates

 

Distribution

Southern Ontario to southern WI and eastern IA, south to OH, IN, IL, and eastern MO, with isolated populations in ME and VA and historic collections from NY, PA, and OK.

Morphology

Herbaceous perennial 40-100 cm; lower leaves lanceolate to broadly linear, 10-20 cm, often blunt; upper leaves much reduced; spike cylindric, 8-20 cm long and 5-7 cm thick; lip and lateral petals white or cream, the sepals green or greenish-white; sepals broadly oval to obovate, 7-13 mm; lateral petals broadly obovate-cuneate, toothed, 8-11 mm long and 4.5-7 mm wide, slightly longer than the sepals; lip 15-21 mm, deeply 3-lobed, the terminal lobe short-clawed, very broadly cuneate, usually deeply notched in the center, long fringed, the lateral lobes fringed to the middle or more; spur slender and elongate, 30-40 mm.

Notes

Flowers June to August

Wetland indicator: FACW

Eastern prairie fringed orchid is federally threatened. It was formerly known from a few locations in NY but has not been seen in many decades. It is replaced in the western portion of the upper Midwest by P. praeclara where the ranges of the two species overlap slightly in eastern IA. A rare hybrid with P. psycodes has been called P. x reznicekii. Seeds grown in vitro require 60 or more days of cold stratification.

References

Gleason, Henry A. and A. Cronquist. 1991. Manual of Vascular Plants of Northeastern United States and Adjacent Canada. Second Ed.

The New York Botanical Garden. Bronx, NY

 

Sheviak, C.J. 2002. Platanthera, In: Flora of North America Editorial Committee, Eds. Flora of North America North of Mexico. Volume 26. Oxford University Press, New York.

 

USDA, NRCS. 2002. The PLANTS Database, Version 3.5 (http://plants.usda.gov).
National Plant Data Center, Baton Rouge, LA 70874-4490 USA.

 


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 Michael Hough © 2018