Platanthera dilatata var. dilatata

This is the easiest of the Platantheras to identify on account of its pure white flowers and its sweet scent. Its white flowers make it more visible than some of the other species, and its scent perfumes the air wherever it grows. It is very common, but always worth seeing.

We have found it on almost every hiking trip and along the roadsides in every mountainous area of the Pacific Northwest, often by the thousands. Along the Yellowhead Highway in the mountains of British Columbia, for example, we have seen it blooming mile after mile in every marshy spot.

There are three varieties of this species, distinguished by the length of the spur, which probably indicates different pollinators for each. Var. albiflora has a spur shorter than the lip, var. dilatata a spur the length of the lip and var. leucostachys, a spur much longer than the lip.

This species also ranges from Alaska across Canada and the northern United States as far south as Pennsylvania and Indiana, California and New Mexico. Varieties albiflora and leucostachys, however, are more limited in range, and can be found only in the western United States and Canada.

Photographed along the Hurricane Ridge Road in Olympic National Park. The other two pictures are of variety albiflora, the short spurred variety.

nativeorchidsofthepacificnorthwest.blogspot.com/2011/02/b...

This was published in the April, 2011, issue of Orchids, the magazine of the American Orchid Society, in an article titled "Taking Aim."