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Volunteers Discover New Population of Rare Orchid Near Crandon

Thomas Meyer, Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources

A volunteer with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources’ Rare Plant Monitoring Program found a new population of a rare orchid near Crandon.

Every year the DNR sends about 60 volunteers to locations around the state to search for rare plants.

The program recently released its 2020 annual report highlighting important discoveries last year, including the detection of a population of calypso orchid in a white cedar swamp near Crandon.

The orchid is magenta with dark purple stripes and yellow hairs.

Kevin Doyle, the program’s coordinator, describes it as a fairy slipper.

“It has a lady slipper-like flower, an inflated pouch that kind of looks like a moccasin or a slipper. Then there’s light magenta petals that hang above it like a sun umbrella,” he said.

Doyle said one volunteer thought she had seen calypso orchids while working as a private contractor in 2017, so she and another volunteer returned to the site on a search mission.

“They got back there and they found one and it wasn’t in flower, but then as they were walking out they found about five flowering orchids and these ones were in flower,” he said.

The calypso orchid is native to Northern Wisconsin, but in recent years, it’s almost disappeared from the area.

The DNR thinks fewer than five populations of the flower remain in the state as climate change pushes the flower farther north.

The discovery of this new population could keep the orchid around a bit longer.

Doyle said he will try to hand pollinate some of the orchids to produce seeds.

If that’s successful, the DNR can try to plant and grow a new population of calypso orchids or augment the current population.

Erin Gottsacker worked at WXPR as a Morning Edition host and reporter from December 2020 to January 2023. During her time at the station, Erin reported on the issues that matter most in the Northwoods.
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