The open plant encyclopedia
Snap a photo or search by any name to see how to care for it, where it comes from, whether it's safe, and a 3D model you can turn.
The plants people record most in your country, and ones that grow there wild.
Filter by what you want to do, shape, origin, country, care and safety.
Epipactis
Also called Helleborines
Epipactis, or helleborine, is a genus of terrestrial orchids consisting of approximately 70 species. This genus is abbreviated as Epcts in horticultural trade.
As is characteristic of all orchids, Epipactis spp. are dependent on a mycorrhizal symbiosis (see also Orchid mycorrhiza). This allows some species to have reduced leaves and need little chlorophyll. Violet helleborine (Epipactis viridiflora) can even do without chlorophyll. These forms can be recognized by their purple instead of violet flowers.
The species occur in temperate and subtropical climates of America, Asia, and Europe. These orchids grow in open spaces in forests, in undergrowth, on calcareous soils and are often found in wet dune-slacks near the sea. The only original American species is the giant helleborine (Epipactis gigantea). One species from Europe, broad-leaved helleborine (Epipactis helleborine), is invasive in North America. Most species are protected.
Royal helleborine · Dune Helleborine · Stream orchid · Broad-leaved Helleborine · Narrow-lipped helleborine · Small-leaved Helleborine · Mueller's Epipactis · Broad-leaved Helleborine · Marsh helleborine · Green Flower Helleborine · Green-flowered Helleborine · Violet Helleborine
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Epipactis by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts are shared under the same licence.
