RHH's photos with the keyword: western spotted coralroot

We are down near the Oregon-California border where we spent the night and will be continuing into California in a little while to Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park. We spent a wonderful day yesterday traveling down the Oregon coast from Cape Perpetua to Brookings. We did some hiking, visited several lighthouses, walked the beaches, explored the tidepools along the coast, and watched the sunset at Meyer's Creek north of Brookings. The day started foggy and gray but soon turned sunny, and though very windy was pleasant. These photos were taken last week in eastern Washington near the town of Leavenworth, a faux German town that is a popular tourist destination. I did not stop in the town but continued orchid hunting at several locations near Leavenworth. Coralroots are strange orchids that have no leaves and most of them no chlorophyll. They often grow in dark forests with little undergrowth, those there were in a somewhat brighter location. Washington has four species of Coralroots including the Western Spotted, but they were very sparse this year in all the locations I visited.

These are the flowers of the Western Spotted Coralroot which is nothing more (above ground) than a flowering stem since they are leafless and without chlorophyll. They were photographed in eastern Washington near Leavenworth.

Coralroots are strange plants, little more than a flowering stem since they are leafless and without chlorophyll. These were photographed near Leavenworth, Washington, on the east side of the Cascades, but grow all over the Pacific Northwest.

This was the second orchid of the new season, the Western Spotted Coralroot, Corallorhiza maculata var. occidentalis, another leafless orchid without chlorophyll that depends for its nourishment on a complex relationship with a soil fungus. This example was photographed in Washington Park on Fidalgo Island, but it is a common orchid even at higher elevations.

This is the Western Spotted Coralroot, a mycotrophic plant without chlorophyll or leaves, photographed along Padden Ridge above Lake Padden. This variety of the Spotted Coralroot blooms earlier than the ordinary variety, is found only in the west, and is distinguished not only by its earlier bloom time but by the rounded lip. The ordinary variety has a lip that is straight-sided. This is one of the more common native orchids in our area.

I've posted several pictures of Coralroots recently and thought I'd post a picture showing how they grow. These are the Western Spotted Coralroot growing in a nice clump in Washington Park near Anacortes. Notice the lack of leaves (they are leafless) and they are without chlorophyll too. This will be my last post for a couple of days. I am leaving shortly on a camping trip with a group of 6-8th graders (I'm one of the chaperones) and will catch everyone up with commenting when I return. Until then, may you all have a good day and a good rest of the week.

The Spotted Coralroots, both the ordinary and the western variety are everywhere in the Pacific Northwest forests at this time of the year. It is rare to be out hiking and not see them. This example was photographed near Leavenworth, Washington near where I photographed the Clustered Lady's Slipper. Like all the other Coralroots these are leafless and without chlorophyll and use a fungus to get their nutrients from the soil. ronaldhanko-orchidhunter.blogspot.com/2013/05/orchid-hunting-in-leavenworth-area.html

I took some time yesterday afternoon to make a brief excursion to the Chuckanut Mountains south of Bellingham to see and photograph a couple of native orchids whose location had been given me by Upupa4me, a friend here on Flickr, and who is an expert at finding and photographing native wildflowers. Upupa4me's wonderful photostream can be seen at: www.flickr.com/photos/40650891@N02/ . Coralroots are leafless saprophytic orchids that have no chlorophyll and that obtain their nourishment by feeding off fungi in the soil. There are five species native to Washington and several distinctive varieties of these species. This plant was photographed along the Interurban Trail near Larrabee State Park in the Chuckanuts.

This is another Coralroot, mycotrophic, leafless and without chlorophyll, and a rare albino form of the Western Spotted Coralroot (there is a picture of the ordinary spotted form just two pictures back), so it is the unspotted Spotted Coralroot. A friend found these and showed them to me recently. nativeorchidsofthepacificnorthwest.blogspot.com/2013/05/fifth-week-of-native-orchid-season.html

This is another shot of the Western Spotted Coralroot, Corallorhiza maculata var. maculata. This species, as noted before, is mycotrophic, feeding off decaying material in the soil through a relationship with a fungus. It was photographed in Larrabee State Park in the Chuckanut Mountains. nativeorchidsofthepacificnorthwest.blogspot.com/2013/05/fifth-week-of-native-orchid-season.html

Found and photographed this in Deception Pass State Park last spring on a school camping trip. It reminds me of spring and of how eager I am to be out hiking again, but it is not a perfect picture. I was struggling with low light, a strong breeze and lenses that were fogging when I took the picture. The Western Spotted Coralroot is Corallorhiza maculata var. occidentalis, and is distinguished from the more common form by the rounded lip. It is leafless and without chlorophyll and obtains its nutrients from rotting material in the soil via a symbiotic relation with a fungus.

Another of the native orchids that grows at Goose Rock, this one photographed along the trail to the top. There were a lot of these, but most of them just a stem or two. This large clump was one of the best examples we've seen. ronaldhanko-orchidhunter.blogspot.com/2012/06/whidbey-isl...

This is the Western Spotted Coralroot, a monotrophic plant, leafless and without chlorophyll and deriving its nourishment from decaying material in the soil through a symbiotic relationship with a soil fungus. It is distinguished from the Spotted Coralroot by the rounded lip and by a slightly earlier blooming time.