Calypso bulbosa and associates, Banff National Park, mid-June

[Kelaidis]

Mark: don't know if you will check this stale thread or not...but I noticed you asking about Dryas drummondii: Laporte Avenue Nursery sells this, and I have grown it for years. It has produced its nodding yellow flowers for me. I don't think it's much harder to grow than typical D. octopetala.

I have also grown the hybrid, although I don't have it currently. I'm surprised both of these aren't grown more often. I suspect they aren't better known because they need to grow in the ground (they have massive roots) rather than pots, ergo: absent from alpine houses...

[McDonough]

Mark: don't know if you will check this stale thread or not...but I noticed you asking about Dryas drummondii: Laporte Avenue Nursery sells this, and I have grown it for years. It has produced its nodding yellow flowers for me. I don't think it's much harder to grow than typical D. octopetala.

Thanks Panayoti, whenever I get back into a plant buying mode, I'll check it out at Laporte, along with a bushel load of other plants on my growing want list.

[cohan]

Nice outing, Lori, and nice to be able to share it with your sister
Calypso is not rare here, but not common either, though not forming large patches generally, probably since it favours semi damp mixed wood spots which are unstable (growing over and becoming too shady, short lived trees falling, etc)..
So I was very impressed to see this clump (Many of you have seen this, but I thought I'd post it here for anyone who hasn't) , also in Banff National Park, close to Lake Louise, just off the road (visible from a roadside pullout); May 30, 2009; unlike plants here, this was growing at the edge of Pine woods (if I am remembering correctly! coniferous trees, at any rate..) with almost no undergrowth to compete with.. It would seem like  a dry place (under the conifers), except for probably heavy snowfall and generally higher precip than here..

[McDonough]

Cohan, a gorgeous clump of Calypso bulbosa, something I hope to encounter in the wild some day.  Looks like there are two varieties in North America, and var. americana comes very close to the little State of Massachusetts based on the USDA plant profile page and distribution map.
http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=CABU

[Lori S.]

A very nice one to see by the roadside, Cohan, and a spectacular clump!

The montane forest around Lake Louise is truly full of them and at incredible density... imagine a density like the clump you show but going for kilometers along the trails!! 
We were a little too early when my sister and I visited (as I realized later, it was a verrrrry late spring in most of the mountain areas that we visit)... I may try to time it a little better this year.

[Paul T]

Wow, Cohan. 

That is amazing.  I always wonder how they'd do here, given our Pterostylis and other terrestrial orchids.  Few of ours ever put up a show nearly as impressive as that.

Thanks for showing us.

[Hoy]

I have a dream - or rather two (at least): 1) to find a clump of Calypso bulbosa in the woods (it is extremely rare in Norway, a little commoner in Sweden); and 2) establish a little clump in my own woodland!

[cohan]

Thanks, all--this was a very short and impromptu stop-there was road work going on nearby, and so the little booth to check park passes (of drivers heading from Lake Louise along the Icefields parkway toward Jasper)was temporarily ( I think) stuck at this little roadside pullout, so we drove along this very short road, which we might not otherwise have done; driving in, I saw some pinky purple something on the edge of the gravel at the mouth of the road (turned out to be a great little pea--Astragalus or similar), and then farther on, I saw flashes of such bright pink in the edge of the woods that my first thought was that there was some plastic garbage blown in there!
Needless to say I requested a stop, ran back to see the pea and the pink turned out to be this fantastic orchid!
Lori, this was just the end of May, but I imagine there could be a couple weeks variation in bloom time depending on snow melt, plus this was likely an extra sunny/early spot. We didn't get any farther off the  road there, but did go in a bit at Hector Lake not too far away, and I did see some tantalising things in bud, seemed early there to see much...
Trond--I've been hoping for a seedpod on this one plant I have found near my house (historically, I knew several small patches on the farm, but have not been able to find any plants in any of them on moving back here), but I think it may be too far from any other flowering plants--no seeds in the last few years..
here's an album from that day in the woods on the farm behind my house:
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/May262010NorthernSpringCalypso#
Its very funny, this album from May 26 shows spring flowers, as does May 30, and May 28 shows gree trees along the road-- May 29 shows a snowstorm, and everything is white!