Henlo. For my first hive post ever I want to show off this cool mysterious plant I found at San Miguel Topilejo in the forest deep soil known as Indian pipe or Ghost plant.
This rare plant does not contain chlorophyll hence its completely white color and incapacity of photosyntesizing its own food. So for survival, it parasites fungi. Her roots are covered with tiny hairs that attach to the mycorrhizal web that connects the fungi to the trees.
It is pollinated by bumblebees mainly but it is of ephemeral occurrence and propagation is very difficult.
In spite of containing glycosides that may be harmful to humans it has been reported to have multiple medicinal uses.
Its existence itself is poetic, I completely get why it was Emily Dickinson’s favorite flower. She drafted her the following poem in 1879:
'Tis whiter than an Indian Pipe –
'Tis dimmer than a Lace –
No stature has it, like a Fog
When you approach the place –
Not any voice imply it here –
Or intimate it there –
A spirit – how doth it accost –
What function hath the Air?
This limitless Hyperbole
Each one of us shall be –
'Tis Drama – if Hypothesis
It be not Tragedy –
’Tis whiter than an Indian Pipe –
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