General: Perennial herb from rhizomes and thickened roots; stems 40-100 cm tall, leafy.
Leaves: Stem leaves lanceolate to egg-shaped, 6-10 cm long, ribbed, gradually reduced upward and downward.
Flowers: Inflorescence terminal, somewhat 1-sided, of several showy flowers, the bracts linear to narrowly lanceolate; sepals green, purple-tinged, especially on outside, lanceolate to egg-shaped, 10-13 mm long, the lower sepals spreading to descending; lateral petals similar to sepals, 8-11 mm long, ascending or curved forward; lip 10-12 mm long, lower half pouchlike, white to pinkish outside, brown to purplish inside, upper half more or less flat, white to pinkish, with 2 thick bumps near base; column 3-5 mm long, curved over lip.
Fruits: Capsules, ellipsoid, spreading to drooping, 1-1.5 cm long.
Notes: The pure white forma monotropoides (Mousley) Scoggan, previously known only from PQ (Scoggan 1978), was recently collected in the Victoria area.
Epipactis helleborine is a distinctive species which is only likely to be mistaken in the wild for the native Epipactis gigantea. A number of key characteristics separate these two species. The flowers of E. gigantea are large, the sepals and petals are 12-20 mm long, and the lips are 14-20 mm long and grooved to the tip (Douglas et al. 2001). The flowers of E. helleborine are smaller, the sepals and petals are 8-13 mm long, and the lips are 10-12 mm long and more or less flat above the middle (Douglas et al. 2001). Modifed from text by the British Columbia Conservation Data Centre, Species and Ecosysems Explorer, 2010.
Ecology
Ecological Framework for Epipactis helleborine
The table below shows the species-specific information calculated from original data (BEC database) provided by the BC Ministry of Forests and Range. (Updated August, 2013)
