Habitat: terrestrial in moist pinelands and moist hardwood forests.
Common name: Southern Twayblade
Blooming: February through May
Comments: this terrestrial orchid is probably more common than the vouchered specimen map above would suggest, but it is so small as to be easily overlooked in the moist woodlands that it calls home, found in both moist pineland bogs and moist hardwood forests. The plant is seldom more than three inches (7.5 cm) tall, with a pair of leaves seldom more than a half-inch (1.2 cm) long. If you are fortunate to find a plant, don't look away, lest you spend another five to ten minutes relocating it. Seedlings consist of only the stem and the pair of leaves, while mature plants will have a flower stem arising from between these leaves. The flowers are a wonder of miniaturization, with petals and sepals only about 1 mm long. The forked lip is by far the most conspicuous part of the flower, reaching lengths of a half-inch (1.2 cm) or so.
