Goodyera
repens, yövilkka
Goodyera repens flowers few weeks in July, just in the same time
as we collect blueberries. I have even seen flowering plants in October,
but it is very exeptional. The species has wide rhizome creeping on and
under mosses of blueberry-woods. It has lot of small leaf-rosetter. Most
of the rosettes never flowers, and others only flower when the rosette
has 6 leaves. It takes two seasons for rosettes to reach that size, so
this is an evergreen species. The inflorescense 
is
one-sided and it has from 10 to 20 small white flowers. Height is about
25 cm (10") in maximum. The flowers are easy to spot, as the areas where
this plant grows in have only very few flowers at the time when Goodyera
blooms. Humble-bees wisit often in the flowers, as they can´t get
nectar from other flowers. The species has two forms, one with green-and-white
leaves and other which is totally green. Grren-leaved is more common. The
species flowers well in each other year, in the years between almost none
flowers can be found. For example 2000 was wonderful year with Goodyeras,
but in 2001 I only found about 10 inflorescenses from all the places I
know.
This species is common in whole Finland exept the extreme north Lapland. It is the most common of Finnish orchids.
