Addisonia 7 



(Plate 124) 



LIMODORUM SIMPSONII 

 Simpson's Grass-pink 



Native oj Florida, the Bahamas, and Cuba 

 Family Orchidaceab Orchid Family 



Limodorum Simpsonii Small, Fl. SE. U. S. 322. 1903. 



Plants erect, a yard tall or less, bright green, glabrous. The 

 leaves are usually three: the first is a short sheathing scale, the 

 second a long sheathing scale, each of them obliquely opened at 

 the top ; while the third has a sheathing base larger than the first and 

 the second and terminates in an elongate linear blade. The blade 

 is erect or nearly so, a quarter of an inch wide or less, often slightly 

 involute, somewhat fleshy, acuminate at the apex, with three to 

 five prominent ribs and more slender intervening ones. The scape, 

 usually exceeding the leaf in length, is wand-like, terminating in a 

 more or less zigzag inflorescence-rachis which bears lanceolate to 

 ovate bracts at the nodes. The flowers are conspicuous, usually 

 few to several on a rachis, sometimes as many as thirty or 

 forty, the parts predominantly rose-purple or pink, or rarely white. 

 The median sepal is elliptic, about one inch long or less, abruptly 

 short-acuminate ; the lateral sepals are broader and shorter than the 

 median one, inequilateral, and abruptly pointed. The petals are 

 about as long as the median sepal, but with more nearly parallel 

 sides, and usually obtuse. Each sepal and petal has five to nine 

 parallel veins, which are connected by distant cross-veinlets. The 

 lip is about five-eighths of an inch long, with two small rounded 

 lateral lobes and a large middle lobe which has a broad obreniform 

 apex, apiculate in the sinus, terminating a narrow stalk-like base. 

 The column is paddle-shaped, with a stalk arising at the base of the 

 lip and dilated into a rhombic or obovate-rhombic blade near the 

 apex, where the anther and the stigma are situated. The capsules 

 are ellipsoid, about three quarters of an inch long, sessile, but some- 

 times with a very short stipe-like base, appressed to the rachis and 

 subtended by the persistent bracts. The seeds are minute and very 

 numerous. 



The Everglades of Florida have only two kinds of showy terres- 

 trial orchids. The one under consideration is the smaller plant, 

 but the more conspicuous of the two. It is widely distributed in 

 the "glades" but more abundant near the edges, where the ground 

 is dry for a considerable part of each year, than it is in the interior. 



It flowers nearly throughout the year, at least in different parts 

 of the Everglades. It occurs either as scattered plants or in large 

 colonies; in the latter case the bright rose-purple flowers are very 



