Plant of the Week
Ghost Orchid
Latin: Polyrrhiza lindenii
Loved the book, hated the movie. In writing these columns about plants I
seldom get the opportunity to do a book review, let alone a movie review. But,
when the opportunity presented itself how could I let it pass. A central
character in both is the ghost orchid (Polyrrhiza lindenii) that
is indigenous to only one place in the world, the 84,000 acre Fakahatchee Strand
State Preserve in southern Florida.
Like most orchids the ghost orchid has beautiful flowers but is an ugly
plant. The solitary white flower is borne on an arching 8-inch peduncle. The
bloom itself is a 6-inch affair with more or less normal orchid pedal
arrangement but with its lower lip producing two long, slightly twisted petals
that extend downward and look like a Fu Man Chu mustache.
The plant itself isn’t there. It’s a ghost. Orchids tend to be a bit on the
bizarre side anyway, but for a plant to grow without any foliage is pushing the
limits of believability. The plant itself consists of just a few cord-like roots
that creep across the bark of a supporting tree trunk, forming a spider-like
cluster about eight inches across. What photosynthesis occurs goes on inside the
fleshy roots.
The ghost orchid would no doubt have remained in botanical obscurity, known
only to a the most fanatic orchid collectors, were it not for Susan Orlean’s
fine 1998 book The Orchid Thief. The book grew out of her adventures and
discoveries as she covered the trial of John Laroche, a Florida man charged
along with three Seminole Indians, for stealing ghost orchids from the
Fakahatchee Strand.
The book is an excellent read for it showcases how a plant novice explores
the quirky world of orchid collecting and the gentle madness that make serious
plant people unique among the species of common man. Like many plant-collecting
fanatics, Laroche seems afflicted with the obsessive-compulsive disorder that
both attracts and repels fellow plant lovers.
But if you got a book, it goes without saying that your agent will try to
pitch the story to Hollywood. But, how can you make a movie about quirky plant
people and an exotic orchid into a movie when it has no sex or violence? Simple.
You tell a completely different story that has no connection whatsoever with the
book.
The movie, Adaptation, tries to tell the story from the perspective of
a struggling screen writer (Nicholas Cage) trying to adapt a book about an
orchid into a movie. To do this - and I know this sounds too preposterous to be
true - they add the Hollywood magic of sex, man-eating alligators, and murder.
While Meryl Streep and Chris Cooper do a good job portraying Orlean and Laroche,
the adaptation of Orchid Thief for the movie Adaptation falls flat
- with little enlightenment and less entertainment.
The ghost orchid is in cultivation, thanks in no small measure to orchid
people like Laroche who illegally collected plants from the wild and propagated
them using tissue culture. Cultivating rare and endangered plants, and
increasing their numbers far beyond what would ever occur in nature presents a
conundrum for conservationists. What is really threatened is the unique habitat
of the swamp, and the ghost orchid is but one member of that complex community.
The argument for maintaining rare and unique ecological areas in a pristine
manner loses some of its punch when you demonstrate that the plant can be grown
in other, far different conditions.
One final note. Those of you able to view the illustration accompanying this
article are also looking at a ghost. The orchid is not real, but an artificial
orchid created by one of our former students, Tom Wu from Taiwan. Tom’s mother
taught him the art of modeling flowers, mainly from paper machete, when he was a
5-year-old and laid up with a leg problem. His master’s of science thesis
involved orchid tissue culture, but today he is the artist designing artificial
flowers for a Chinese factory that exports them to the West.
By: Gerald Klingaman, retired
Extension Horticulturist
- Ornamentals
Extension News -
February 21, 2003
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