Nothing quite so lovely as a wild orchid

[Steve Foss]

As some of you know, I'm on a long quest to photograph every wild orchid species in Minnesota. As of today, with the addition of the striped coralroot and small round-leaved orchid, I am about half way to the 40 or so orchid species in the state.

As luck would have it, I've already got four of the rarest orchids in the state, but there are many still to go, some of which grow only in more southern Minnesota climes, and some that are rare.

I had to include a couple old friends in today's work, too, the calypso orchid and yellow ladyslipper.

The round-leaved orchid, as you can see, still has plenty of days of prime bloom left as the blossoms open their way up the flower stalk. Yellows will be prime for another week or more. The striped coralroot also has a fair amount of prime time left. The calypsos, on the other hand, are almost all past prime. The ones photographed here were only a handful out of the 200 we saw today that were still nice enough to photograph. The rest were a desicated brown.

These were all captured near Bemidji today.

Small round-leaves orchids

Striped coralroot

Calypso orchid

Small yellow ladyslipper

[Dbl]

Beautiful!

[Sturg]

Spectacular photos!

[gatorhunter]

My absolute favourite wildflower...Calypso Orchid AKA Venus Ladyslipper. Unfortunately I haven't seen one in the wild in many years. Such a beautifully delicate little flower.

[CFRay]

All Wonderful! #3 made me look a couple of times.

[Steve Foss]

Thanks guys. I very much enjoy wildflower photography in general, but those orchids, even the ones with tiny green unobtrusive flowers, are the coolest!

Please excuse me if these appear too dark or saturated on your monitors. I prepped them on my traveling laptop, and no matter how I calibrate it, online photos appear just a bit pale and washed out, so I tend to darken them and saturate them a bit too much when using that laptop.

[delcecchi]

You are out of my class. Here is one from our campsite in quetico.

These seemed fairly common. More common than in days gone by. My cute little canon shirt pocket elph isn't bad.

[flipper]

Very nice Steve. I'm impressed. Where could I find some good pics of the orchids that are found in Southern Minnesota. I know some spots where there use to be some ladyslippers but, unfortunately, I think someone tried to transplant them.

[JayinMN]

Wow, you really highlighted some often unnoticed flowers. I can't say I have seen any of them except the lady slippers. Thanks for sharing!

[JayinMN]

I saw lots of little pink flowers in the bog a few weeks ago and got curious now. After looking at wild flowers online, I think they were Polygala paucifolia (Gaywings). Not sure if they are of any interest to you or not. I am guessing they are pretty common?

[Steve Foss]

Jason, polygala are common up here, but beautiful all the same.

[JayinMN]

I figured they must be sine they seemed to be everywhere.