WILDFLOWERS OF NEW MEXICO

With a showy rosette of evergreen leaves and a bloom stalk to 8-inches tall and lined with delicate white flowers, this orchid stands out year-around in the leaf litter of a shady forest floor. Note the broad, deep-green leaves with showy white midribs. 

FLOWERS: July–September (depending on elevation). Flowers bloom from the top down along one side of a spike-like raceme with 10–48 flowers. Each 1/2-inch long flower has a white hood and boat-shaped lip. Note the sepals are green and covered with hairs. Flowers last about 2 weeks.

LEAVES: Basal rosette. Leaves evergreen, 1–4 inches long (2.5–10 cm), elliptic to oval with the midrib streaked with white, sometimes spreading into lateral veins; margins entire.

HABITAT: Moist rich soils of forests, bogs, stream sides; ponderosa-Douglas fir, spruce-fir forests.

ELEVATION: 8,000–10,500 feet.

RANGE: AZ, CO, NM UT; all Rocky Mountain states and westward.

SIMILAR SPECIES: Dwarf Rattlesnake Plantain, G. repens, in much the same habitat and range, is less that 6-inches tall (15 cm) and has  1/4-inch long flowers with white sepals and petals, and usually leaves with a green midrib and a network of white lateral veins; leaves occasionally solid green.

NM COUNTIES: Throughout most NM mountains in moist high-elevation habitats: Bernalillo, Catron, Cibola, Colfax, Grant, Los Alamos, Mora, Otero, Rio Arriba, San Juan, San Miguel, Sandoval, Santa Fe, Taos.