Corallorhiza wisteriana / spring coralroot

Adjectives: clonal, interesting bits, mycoheterotroph, mycorrhizal, native, understory

Also known as: arousing coralroot, Wister’s coralroot

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Spring coral-root, as the name suggests, appears in early spring, but into summer. The photos in the gallery were taken in early June in the Valley. The species occurs in a broad array of coniferous to deciduous habitats in humus rich soils, but doesn’t appear in all years and when it does is really inconspicuous. The scapes are quite slender and less than 9 inches tall, and scattered in the leaf litter, so they are not easy to find.

The flowering stalks (scapes) range in color from yellow-green to yellowish-brown to reddish-purple.  They grow from a clonal clump from coral-shaped roots which can, supposedly, get up to 8-10 inches across. If you find a plant, DO NOT dig it up to check that. Idaho Fish and Game classifies it as S2, meaning it is considered imperiled because of rarity at the state level.

The spring coralroot inflorescence is a raceme with varying numbers (up to 16) and spacings of the flowers. Although the photos in the gallery were taken before they really opened, there are at least two which are visible. Actually, “open” flowers can range from “fully” open and spreading, to “converging” but not actually closed.

The flowers are usually reddish to purplish to yellow-green and last only a few hours. The petals are usually spotted with purple, while the lip is generally white with reddish-purple spots. The defining difference between spring and spotted coralroot flowers is that spring coralroot does not have the eared tabs on the lip that spotted does. Again, this is visible (sort of) in the gallery photos.

Spring coralroot can stay dormant underground for years between blooms. This, combined with the inconspicuous flowers and small size, results in uncertainty about its true population size and distribution. Still, you can look for it  in a variety of moist habitats… floodplains, forests and woodlands.

Interesting bits – Like both striped and spotted coralroots, spring coralroot is a mycoheterotroph. It has no chlorophyll and the leaves are reduced to sheaths surrounding the scape. Thus, the nutrients required for growth are all received from a fungus which is itself mycorrhizal on a tree. The nutrient-poor seeds also must be infected by a (different) mycorrhizal fungus for germination, and to provide the nutrients for early development.