Crazy alien plant/fungus/organism

cougarmagic · Post by **cougarmagic** » Sun Jan 06, 2013 7:50 pm

What is this? It is growing in Topanga State Park, in dense oak woodland. The 'shoots' are about 4" high. At first I thought, whoah - snow plant HERE? But the structure is totally different.

Gene · Post by **Gene** » Mon Jan 07, 2013 8:21 am

Interesting. I looked at a lot of California native plants but didn't see anything quite like that. There are some parasitic plants that grow in a row like these, but most pictures feature flowers not sprouts.

http://calphotos.berkeley.edu/flora/

atomicoyote · Post by **atomicoyote** » Mon Jan 07, 2013 6:54 pm

Its been a l-o-n-g time since my botany days in college, so I can't be exact without a picture of the flower, but I'm pretty sure its a species of Coral Plant. It grows in leaf litter under a tree canopy, doesn't have chlorophyll of its own (teh reason for the red color), so it relies on a symbiotic relation with fungi for food. Nice find.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corallorhiza_striata

Gene · Post by **Gene** » Mon Jan 07, 2013 7:44 pm

atomicoyote wrote: Its been a l-o-n-g time since my botany days in college, so I can't be exact without a picture of the flower, but I'm pretty sure its a species of Coral Plant. It grows in leaf litter under a tree canopy, doesn't have chlorophyll of its own (teh reason for the red color), so it relies on a symbiotic relation with fungi for food. Nice find.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corallorhiza_striata

I think you have it, there are several variates, an Orchid no less.

Corallorhiza maculata This link has two views of sprouting plants.
http://www.google.com/imgres?hl=en&neww ... 0,s:0,i:88

Corallorhiza striata