Glands or viscid disks (to which the pollen-masses are attached) naked and exposed, separate, sometimes widely so (becoming attached, some to the proboscis, others to the face or head of insects feeding upon the nectar of the spur, the pollen thus carried from one blossom to another); otherwise nearly as in true Orchis; the lateral sepals, however, mostly spreading. (Name from habena, a thong or rein, in allusion to the shape of the lip or spur of some species.)
§ 1. GYMNADÈNIA. Cells of the anther parallel and approximate, their glands therefore contiguous. (Appendages of the stigma in our species two or three and much developed, oblong or club-shaped.)
1. H. tridentàta, Hook. Stem slender (6–12´ high), with a single oblong or oblanceolate obtuse leaf below, and 2 or 3 small ones like bracts above; spike 6–12-flowered, oblong; flowers greenish or whitish, very small; lip wedge-oblong, truncate, and with 3 short teeth at the apex; the slender and slightly club-shaped spur curved upward, longer than the ovary.—Wet woods, N. Eng. to Minn. and Ind., and south in the mountains to N. C. June, July.—Root of few fleshy fibres. Appendages of the stigma three, oblong-club-shaped, one outside each orbicular gland and one between them, rising as high as the anther-cell, their cellular viscid summits receiving pollen in the unopened flower, and penetrated by pollen-tubes!
2. H. íntegra, Spreng. Root of very fleshy fibres (or some of them tuber-like); stem several-leaved (15´ high), the 1 or 2 lower leaves elongated, oblong-lanceolate, acute, the others becoming smaller and bract-like; spike densely many-flowered, oblong-cylindrical; flowers orange-yellow, small, lip ovate, entire or slightly crenulate or wavy, shorter than the awl-shaped descending spur.—Wet pine-barrens, N. J. to Fla. July.—Appendages of the stigma two, lateral, oblong, fleshy; beak or middle appendage narrow.
3. H. nívea, Spreng. Stem slender, 1–1½° high, many-leaved, the 1 or 2 lower leaves lance-linear and 4–8´ long, the others small and bract-like; spike cylindrical, loosely many-flowered; flowers white, small; petals and entire lip linear-oblong; spur thread-shaped, ascending, as long as the white ovary, which is not twisted.—Pine-barren swamps, S. Del. to Fla. Aug.
§ 2. PERULÀRIA. Cells of the anther nearly parallel, the valves of each extended at base so as to form the sides of a deep oblong groove or cavity, which is lined by the dilated orbicular and incurved gland. (Flowers small, greenish, slender-spurred.)
4. H. viréscens, Spreng. Leaves ovate-oblong or oblong-lanceolate, the uppermost linear-lanceolate and pointed, passing into the bracts of the elongated raceme; petals ovate; flowers dull green; lip furnished with a tooth on each side and a strong nasal protuberance in the middle of the base, oblong, truncate-obtuse, about the length of the sepals, half the length of the slender club-shaped spur.—Wet places, common; N. Eng. to Fla., west to Minn. and Mo. June, July.—Stem 10–20´ high; the spike at first dense, with the bracts longer than the flowers, at length elongated and often loose, the upper bracts shorter than the flowers, which are quite small, and with scarcely a tinge of yellow, drying brownish.
§ 3. PLATANTHÈRA. Cells of the anther sometimes parallel, more commonly divergent, so that their tapering bases and the exposed glands are more or less distant. (Root a cluster of fleshy fibres, or tuberous-thickened.)
[*] Flowers greenish or white, small, numerous in a close spike; spur not longer than the entire or merely notched narrow lip; anther-cells almost parallel, wholly adnate; stem leafy.
[+] Spur short and sac-like; the 3 sepals and 2 narrow petals erect; glands small, rather widely separated.