Calypso bulbosa

[lambelkip]

The clumps usually dissapear, even in protected areas. it's just not practical to have them watched 24 hours a day. What's really sad is that the plants are partial myco-heterotrophs, and usually do not survive being removed from the area where the mycorhizae grows.

[ronaldhanko]

Originally Posted by lambelkip

The clumps usually dissapear, even in protected areas. it's just not practical to have them watched 24 hours a day. What's really sad is that the plants are partial myco-heterotrophs, and usually do not survive being removed from the area where the mycorhizae grows.

I know that's the case with many other orchids - people dig them up and try to grow them, but they won't grow without the soil fungus. Some, apparently are even associated with particular trees = the fungus they need will only gow in association with certain trees.

[ronaldhanko]

It's sad how stupid people can be. I remember being up in the Rockies watching a woman pick a bouquet for herself from the tundra - many of the flowers were wilting by the time she got pack to her car and she just threw the whole lot away. She did this in spite of the signs asking people to stay on the paths and got very angry when we said something to her.

[greenbean]

Those people REALLY make me mad! They think they have the right to do whatever they want because it's public land. What they don't seem capable of grasping is that they are ruining things for the rest of the public!!!

I found a single Calypso in the state park next to my house one year while cleaning the trail with my high school ecology club. I was with the front group and we all worked so hard not to disturb the orchid. Then this ditzy cheerleader (nothing against cheerleaders in general, she was just an airhead) comes along in the second group and says, literally, "ooh, pretty flower!" and picks it. Calypso roots are so fragile that even picking the flowers can break them and kill the plant. I never saw that Calypso again, but at least I found another one further down the trail, which means there must be a few more that are, thankfully, not visible to passersby.


oops...so much for my "quick" reply...

[Quinn]

Fortunatly I was lucky to get the ones I have and have had sucsessfully for 3 years legally. I watched a group of these beauties for years, which grew nearly 1/4 of a mile behind my house. Until one day I went for the walk to find the entire area demolished by a logging operation.

I was to say the least mortified. I wrote to the government about my distress over the destruction of a very large patch of these. They refused to put any effort into the conservation of these plants, and gave me permission to harvest these plants. So the next day I went in with my ATV and a shovel and hauled the whole lot along with half a foot of earth to an area on my property where the environment was the same. They are doing amazing well.

I moved from the property about 3 years ago and took a clump with me which have been doing great in a large barrel wich a mulch with pine needles on a regular basis. Luckily the property is owned by my whole family so I can go and see the colony of them whenever I please.

I am glad I did what I did. The entire 40 acre area in which these beauties inhabited is now a rural subdivision.