Please, never pick or attempt to transplant 
Orchids (or any other) wild plant. 
Click to purchase plants from legitimate plant nurseries.
Many Orchids are endangered.
Orchid habitat is very specialized.
Orchid pollination is very specialized.
Orchid germination is very specialized.
Admire them in the wild and let them live.

Also see Corallorhiza maculata and Corallorhiza striata, Calypso bulbosa, Epipactis gigantea, Cypripedium calceolus, and Green Orchids.

Blooming information withheld to protect the Orchids.

In the Four Corners area, these minute Orchids have been found only in Colorado in the two locations where these photographs were taken. The plants enjoy shady, moist forests, especially at streamsides.  Basal leaves are almost always singular and large; flowers are minute and spread openly along a leafless stalk. The plants are very difficult to find and it is the leaf that attracts attention.

Joseph Banks (who funded Captains Cook and Bligh) named this species Orchis obtusata in 1814, John Richardson renamed it Habenaria obtusata in 1823, John Lindley renamed it Platanthera obtusata in 1835, and Per Axel Rydberg renamed it Lysiella obtusata in 1900.

Orchid authority Charles Sheviak indicates that the correct genus for this plant is Platanthera, Greek for "wide anthers", referring to the flower's broad anthers. "Obtusata" is from the Latin for "blunt", referring to the leaf shape.

For more information on Colorado Orchids, click for Scotty Smith's "Orchids of Colorado". Scotty's widely praised article includes photographs, line drawings, and descriptive information.

Blooming information withheld to protect the Orchids.

Blooming information withheld to protect the Orchids.

The bottom right flower shows that the flower lip (in the lower right corner) is as long as the spur (light green/white and pointing downward parallel and next to the green stem).  The tip of the spur can also be seen near the pedicel (the flower stem) in the flower at upper right.  Flower color is white to green/white.

Blooming information withheld to protect the Orchids.

In this photograph, the lip, spur, sepals, petals, and reproductive parts show more clearly.

Range map © John Kartesz,
Floristic Synthesis of North America

State Color Key

Species present in state and native
Species present in state and exotic
Species not present in state

County Color Key

Species present and not rare
Species present and rare
Species extirpated (historic)
Species extinct
Species noxious
Species exotic and present
Native species, but adventive in state
Eradicated
Questionable presence

Range map for Platanthera obtusata