Sakhalin saddle-flower

Family: Orchids. The Sakhalin saddle-flower grows in coniferous and stone-birch forests of Japan.

The Sakhalin saddle-flower is a small plant up to 16 cm tall with a filiform creeping rhizome and a slender stem, bearing two membranous sheaths and one oval petiolate leaf up to 2.5 cm long. The inflorescence consists of 2-5 nodding flowers, greenish, spaced apart, with very small bracts that are semitransparent and slightly serrated at the tip. Perianth segments are oblong-elliptic, obtuse, the inner ones slightly shorter than the outer ones; 5.5 mm long and 2.25 mm wide. The lip is oblong-lingulate, of the same length, directed downward, with a short claw and broad auricles, and above with a small two-lobed thickening. The column up to 4 mm long, arcuately curved, thin. The ovary is glabrous on a slightly twisted pedicel. Blooms in July-August.