Part 49

1. A. spicatum (Walter) B. S. P., 1788-1888.

1.—APLECTRUM SPICATUM (Walter) B. S. P., 1788-1888

(Aplectrum hyemale Nuttall, 1818)

PUTTY-ROOT—ADAM-AND-EVE

The specific name, spicatum, refers to the flowers growing in a spica, or spike.

Tall, spiked damp sandy woodland or bogland orchid, with bulbous or corm-like roots. May 22d-July 1st (Northern States); April 20th-July 1st (Southern States).

=Flowers=, 1-9 dull yellowish-brown, mixed with purple, 1 inch long, short-pediceled, in a loose raceme 2-4 inches long. =Labellum= shorter than petals, 3-lobed. =Sepals= and =petals= ½ inch long, linear-lanceolate. =Stem= or =scape= 1-2 feet high, producing 3 scales above the leaf. =Leaf= 1, basal, arising at side of scape, from the latest bulb or corm; elliptic, 4-6 inches long, appearing about September 9th, hyemal—lasting through the winter.

Continental Range—From Ontario, southward to Georgia and Alabama; westward to Minnesota, Oregon, Idaho, Washington, and probably California.

This species, like those of Corallorhiza, is not a definite dated flowering orchid; in the Virginian ravines it blooms as early as April 20th while in Wisconsin, and Missouri it blooms as late as July 1st. The average date for New England is from May 22d-June 25th.

New England Range—Maine, rare; New Hampshire, rare; Vermont, rare; Massachusetts, rare; Rhode Island, not reported; Connecticut, rare.

TABLE OF MEASUREMENTS.

ENGLISH METRIC.

1½ inch (1″) = 2 millimetres (mm.). 1 inch (1′) = 2.5 centimetres (cm.). 1 foot (1°) = 3 decimetres (dm.).

FOOTNOTES

Thoreau, Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, p. 244.

Thoreau, “Walking,” Excursions, p. 252.

Burroughs, A Year in the Fields.

Milton, Comus.

Whittier, The Mayflowers.

Thoreau, The Maine Woods, p. 34.

L. H. Bailey, Jr., Talks Afield, p. 128. 1885.

Thoreau, “Walking,” Excursions, p. 252.

Henry Baldwin, Orchids of New England, Plate 8, 1894.

Henry Baldwin, Orchids of New England, p. 38, 1894.

Henry Baldwin’s Orchids of New England, p. 37, 1884.

Thomas Wentworth Higginson, The Procession of the Flowers, p. 47.

Gray, Fertilization of Orchids, in Sill. Journ. 1862-1863.

C. A. Crandall, Plant World, p. 6. Jan., 1900.