Common Name: ORCHID FAMILY
Habit: Perennial herb, terrestrial [growing on other pls], non-green (nutrition from association of roots with fungi) or green, generally from rhizomes or tubers with few to many fleshy to slender roots; cauline leaves +- reduced to sheathing stem bracts or not. Leaf: 1--many, basal to cauline, linear to +- round, alternate to opposite (if only 1 pair), generally sessile. Inflorescence: flowers 1--many, spike or raceme, bracted. Flower: bisexual, bilateral, in bud generally rotating 180° by twisting ovary (position of parts indicated after twisting); sepals generally 3, generally free, generally petal-like, uppermost generally erect, lateral with chin- or spur-like projection (mentum) or not; petals 3, 1 (lip) different, spurred or not; stamens generally 1 (3 in Cypripedium, 2 functional, 1 a staminode), fused with style, stigma into column, pollen generally lumped, generally removed as unit by insect; ovary inferior, 1-chambered, placentas 3, parietal, stigma 3 lobed, generally under column tip. Fruit: capsule. Seed: many, minute.
Genera In Family: +- 800 genera, +- 25000 species: especially tropics (worldwide except Antarctica). Many cultivated for ornament, especially Cattleya, Cymbidium, Epidendrum, Oncidium, Paphiopedilum; Vanilla planifolia Andrews fruits used to flavor food. Note: Platanthera may be paraphyletic without inclusion of Piperia (Bateman et al. 2009 Ann Bot 104:431--445); study needed.
eFlora Treatment Author: Ronald A. Coleman, Dieter H. Wilken & William F. Jennings, except as noted
Scientific Editor: Ronald A. Coleman, Thomas J. Rosatti.

Common Name: TWAYBLADE
Habit: Rhizomes slender. Leaf: cauline, 2, +- opposite, generally ovate to +- round. Inflorescence: raceme, +- open; flower bract < flower. Flower: sepals +- equal, green to +- purple, lower spreading; lateral petals +- like sepals, ascending to erect; lip generally > sepals, petals, spreading to descending, generally wedge-shaped, flat, tip entire to deeply lobed; column subcylindric, straight to curved, anther at tip. Fruit: generally spreading.
Etymology: (Martin Lister, English naturalist, 1638--1711) Note: Names available in Neottia (earlier name), with same epithets, for all California taxa if Listera treated as congeneric with that genus.
eFlora Treatment Author: Ronald A. Coleman, L.K. Magrath, Dieter H. Wilken & William F. Jennings
Reference: Coleman 1995 Wild Orchids Calif. Cornell Univ