Leafy-stemmed plants, from a cluster of thick fibrous roots. Flowers small, greenish, in a long open spike with long bracts. Sepals and petals broad, spreading. Lip lanceolate, with a tooth on each side and a tubercle at the middle of the base or nearly orbicular. Spur slender, straight, longer than the lip, but shorter than the ovary. Valves of the anthers horizontal, opening upward, dilated at the base so as to form an oblong cavity, enclosing the orbicular incurved gland. Pollinia granulose, produced at the base into a caudicle. [Latin, a little wallet]

About 4 species, of the north temperate zone. Besides the following, another occurs in the southeastern States.

1. Perularia Flava (L.) Farwell. Tubercled Orchis. Small Pale-Green Orchis

Fig. 1362

Orchis flava L. Sp. PI. 942. 1753.

Orchis virescens Willd. Sp. PI. 4: 37. 1805.

Habenaria virescens Spreng. Syst. 3: 688. 1826.

H. flava A. Gray, Am. Journ. Sci. 38: 308. 1840.

P. flava Farwell, Ann. Rep. Parks Detroit 11:54. 1900.

Stem rather stout, 1°-2° high, leafy. Leaves lanceolate or elliptic, acute or obtuse, 4'-12' long, 8"-3' wide; spike 2'-6' long; bracts acuminate, longer than the ovaries; petals greenish; sepals and petals ovate or roundish, about 3" long; sepals greenish yellow, lip a little longer than the petals, entire or crenulate, mostly with an obtuse tooth on each side and a tubercle at the middle of the base; anther-sacs parallel, the sides forming a rounded cavity, in which lie the orbicular incurved glands; capsule about 4" long.

In moist soil, Nova Scotia and Ontario to Minnesota, Florida and Louisiana and Missouri. Yellow or greenish orchis. Green rein-orchis. Races differ in the shape of the lip. June-July.