The rest of the orchids...

To begin with, if you are expecting strongly attractive and colorful plants, only a couple of the following are going to be that way.  As someone who isn't all that old, my life list of plants and animals I haven't seen and want to could stretch the length of Sangamon county.  Thankfully, I plan to correct this ASAP.   In order of discovery are the other orchids I have seen in the U.S. that are native.

The dark leaves in the center are Tipularia discolor overwintering leaves, the Crane-Fly orchid, in Georgian woods.  The specific preserve is Flatwoods Nature Area, owned by the Southern Conservation Trust.  This is a fairly common orchid for the East Coast.  Like Aplectrum, this species blooms in the summer and produces an overwintering leaf that disappears in the spring.  However, the distinctively warped appearance of Tipularia, as well as the purple underside of the leaf, serve to distinguish it.

 Tipularia orchids are only found in the Shawnee Hills in Illinois.  This is the edge of their range, which stretches from Texas to Massachusetts.  Disjunct populations can also be found in northern Indiana.

Next up we have a bit of a story.  I was looking for the Tipularia discolor I had found earlier at a second location, Line Creek Natural Area in Peachtree City, Georgia.  This is a glade/wetland and a diversity hotspot, one of the best places I have ever hiked.  Seriously.  That will be the topic of a future post.   Whilst there, hunting among the brush,  I noted a small green plant, and lost it completely.

Meet Malaxis unifolia, one of the smallest orchids in North America.  The flowers are so tiny that they are horribly out of focus for the average camera, aka mine.  Also, this is the third orchid in a row that I have found with only one leaf (the one above is actually two separate plants).  Next to it are pine saplings, and they are't much over two inches.  The taller plant is roughly six inches at most.  That's about the maximum height of this minute species.

Here is my best picture. This specimen was nearly out of flower, but seems to have set at least three seedpods, indicating a healthy population.  I saw about sixty of these scattered under the oak/maple/pine woods, mixed with ferns and saplings.  This was a more remote northern section of the preserve, right along the trail.  This remains the only native orchid I have seen in flower. These are recorded from Cook, Henderson, Hancock, Menard, Clinton, and Williamson counties in Illinois, and seem to be extremely rare here.  I would love to know where the Menard county population is, but it's likely on private land.

While still on the hunt for Tipularia at Line Creek, I found this:

This is Goodyera pubescens, an unusual species known as rattlesnake plantain.  The leaves, not the flowers, are the attraction.  Mind you, that is a still-growing flower stem, not a flower.  Goodyera pubescens is perhaps the most common orchid in the Appalachians and the Northeast.  It can also be found in the Chicago area, a few central Illinois counties, and the Shawnee hills in Illinois.

Here is a second specimen, found along an unnamed trail that leads to a view of Linville Falls in North Carolina  from the right side of the falls where most pictures are taken.

Here is a larger population along the Graveyard Fields trails west of Brevard, NC.

At first glance this appears to be Goodyera pubescens, but in fact this is the rare G. repens, easier to spell and almost as attractive.  It's almost impossible to find as well because each leaf is about an inch long at most, less on this specimen.  It's an endangered species in North Carolina.  This was found along the same Linville Falls trail.  This species is not found in Illinois.  It was found under dense rhododendron cover along the trail.

  These are the largest specimens I found on the trail.  Compared to  5cm Rhododendron leaves, this species is tiny. I heavily suspect it is more common in reality but goes unnoticed.  Moving one leaf can entirely shade out this plant and hide it from view.

So that concludes the orchids I have seen.  Please comment below which one was your favorite and which ones you have found in Illinois and where.