This week, I continue the story of the great Blackfoot Chief Crowfoot. I also take a look at one of our most beautiful orchids, the yellow ladyslippper
A New Review of the Podcast
Before I reprise the story of Crowfoot, I wanted to give a shout out to an iTunes listener with the screen name Jul121314 in the U.S. for the kind review. The review is titled “Great Storytelling”. They continue saying: “Love listening to the stories – current and historical. I love the Canadian Rockies and this podcast gives me a much deeper understanding. ”
Thank you so much. Those that know me will tell you that I’m always trying to find the “story” hidden within a subject. Science and history are full of fascinating stories, and my goal with this show is to make sure that you always have a great story to enjoy.
Crowfoot and Treaty 7
In last week’s episode, I introduced you to the Blackfoot Chief Crowfoot. He was born at a time when the Blackfoot ruled the plains from Cypress Hills to the Continental Divide and from Montana to the North Saskatchewan River.
If you haven’t listened to that episode, you can enjoy it at www.MountainNaturePodcast.com/ep062. When I wrapped the episode, the Northwest Mounted Police had marched westward to chase away whiskey traders that had invaded Canadian territory from Montana.
Crowfoot was happy the government would remove the whiskey that had ravaged his people, but he still wanted to better understand the role of the Mounties on Blackfoot territory.
Once the Mounties were settled into their camp at Fort MacLeod, Colonel Macleod requested a meeting with the leaders of the Blackfoot Nation. When the meeting finally took place, and the leaders of the Blackfoot, Blood, and Piegan were gathered, Crowfoot asked Macleod to help the people understand the role of the police in their territory.
By the time Crowfoot left Fort Macleod, he felt a strong affinity to the Colonel. Both understood the importance of peaceful relations and Crowfoot had already seen how the police were able to put an end to the trade of whiskey to his people.
Crowfoot also felt Macleod was a man of his word. It was a precarious time for the nations of the Confederacy, and trust was critical if they were to move forward.
Crowfoot saw this as a sign that the old ways had to change. He began to discourage his followers from raiding enemy camps to steal horses. The era of intertribal warfare would need to end.
On the short term, the fortunes of the nations of the Blackfoot improved. With the expulsion of the whiskey trade, the Blackfoot Nation began to rebound. Rather than booze, they once again began to trade for horses and other goods necessary for their people.
Despite this short-term feeling of complacency, Crowfoot saw disheartening changes within their territory. What had started as a trickle, was gradually becoming a flood of white men into Blackfoot territory. At the same time, the once plentiful buffalo were beginning to decline.
For a nation so culturally tied to the previously endless herds of bison, Crowfoot imagined a time when the buffalo may no longer roam the plains. As incomprehensible as it would have been to him a few years earlier, Crowfoot worried for the future of his people.
Reverend MacDougall, Crowfoots long-trusted friend explained that other First Nations had signed treaties with the Canadian government and that these treaties would ensure the rights of the Blackfoot by spelling out their claims to what must have felt like an endlessly shrinking landscape.
It’s likely that Crowfoot could not have any real concept of what a treaty would mean for his people, as well as what they would be giving up. What he did know was that more whites came every year and along with them fewer buffalo were available to hunt.
It was only a matter of time before once endless herds were a memory and he knew there needed to be some agreement with the government of the whites.
There was ample reason to be sceptical of any treaty with the government. The southern members of the Blackfoot Nation signed a treaty with the American government in 1855.
It wasn’t long before it became obvious it wasn’t worth the paper it was written upon. Monies due were never on time, the quality of the promised supplies continually dropped over time, and more settlers meant the government continually insisted on changing terms of agreements already signed.
When gold was discovered in Montana in the 1860s, the trickle of white settlers became a torrent. This led the Bloods and Piegan to defend their territory prompting Americans to send in the cavalry. The “Blackfoot War” as the dispute became known was finally settled when the Cavalry slaughtered 173 Piegan in an undefended camp. Most of the victims were women and children.
When the Mounties arrived in the west, several of the Chiefs that would be asked to sign the Canadian Treaty were also signatories of the disastrous American one as well.
Late in 1875, Crowfoot called a council of chiefs to discuss the possibility of a treaty with the Canadians. Along with all five head chiefs representing the three tribes, an additional 10 minor chiefs took part. They created a petition which was presented at the newly built Fort Calgary.
They complained that white settlers were homesteading without restriction, usually in the best hunting grounds, and that incursions were increasingly common with Cree and mixed-blood Metis that were also hunting buffalo in their territory.
Since no Indian Commissioner had been sent to them, they insisted that one:
“visit us this summer at the Hand Hills and [state] the time of his arrival there, so we could meet with him and hold a Council for putting a [stop] to the invasion of our country, till our Treaty be made with the government.”
South of the border, a treaty with the Sioux, like the Blackfoot Treaty of 1855, had been signed in 1868, giving them hunting rights along the North Platte River and east of the Bighorn Mountains. Whites were to be excluded as long as there was good hunting for the Sioux.
Well, all of that quickly fell apart when gold was found in the Black Hills in 1874. Prospectors flooded Sioux lands, and despite the pleas of the Sioux that the government honour the treaty, they were instead met with soldiers of the United States Cavalry.
When the Sioux rebelled, the cavalry led by General George Crook, descended upon a large gathering of Cheyenne and Sioux along the Powder River. The carnage forced many to surrender and return to their reservation, but it also radicalized many who moved west to gather their strength for the coming conflict.
Central to this was the great Sioux chief Sitting Bull. He sought to build a broad alliance, among both friend and enemy, to fight a common foe. Emissaries were sent to neighbouring tribes to seek allies in the coming conflict. One of these messengers was sent to the camp of Crowfoot. He offered a gift of tobacco, as well as horses, mules, and should they defeat the Americans, white women slaves.
They also promised that once the Cavalry were defeated, they would ride north to rid the plains of the white men. The police were few and the people of the plains were many.
Crowfoot needed little time to turn down offers of war with the whites, particularly with the Sioux who had long been their enemies. His message was met with a threat. The Sioux were strong and had a plan to destroy the soldiers; then they would come for the Blackfoot along with the police.
As is often the case, timing is everything. When the news of the threat arrived in Crowfoot’s camp, Inspector Cecil Denny happened to be present. Crowfoot shared with him the entire story. Denny promised the protection of the police to the Blackfoot, and Crowfoot offered 2000 warriors should the Sioux march north.
The year was 1876 and Crowfoot stated:
“we all see that the day is coming when the buffalo will all be killed, And we shall have nothing more to live on… Then you’ll come into our camp and see the poor Blackfoot starving. I know that the heart of the capital white soldier will be sorry for us, and they will tell the great mother who will not let her children starve.
We are getting shut in. The Crees are coming into our country from the north, and the white men from the south and east, and they are all destroying our means of living; but still, although we plainly see these days coming, we will not join the Sioux against the whites, but will depend upon you to help us.”
This speech impressed Denny who sent a copy to Queen Victoria who personally responded to the chief to thank him for his loyalty. While this was playing out in Canada, Sitting Bull had already routed General George Armstrong Custer at the Little Bighorn in Montana.
However, rather than following up on their threats, the Sioux realized their time in American territory was finished and they fled north into the Cypress Hills within Canadian territory. Sitting Bull, who had threatened to wipe the Mounties from the landscape, instead assured these same Mounties that he would break no laws in Canada.
Again, Sitting Bull sent gifts of tobacco to Crowfoot’s camp. This time the message was one of peace and friendship. The chief refused to smoke the tobacco until he understood Sitting Bull’s true intentions. To his surprise, a party of Sioux, including Sitting Bull himself arrived at his camp. They both pledged peace and smoked the tobacco.
The following year, the Canadian Government arranged to negotiate a treaty with the Blackfoot. Colonel James Macleod and Lieutenant Governor David Laird were appointed as commissioners charged with negotiating a treaty with the nations of the Confederacy. The presence of Sitting Bull in Canadian territory helped hasten the urgency of cementing a positive arrangement with such a powerful nation.
At the same time, cattle were beginning to make their presence known on the plains and many envious eyes were looking westward towards the plentiful grasslands of Alberta, or what would eventually be Alberta.
To complicate matters, in 1872 the government had promised a railroad link to British Columbia to connect it with the rest of the nation. This meant that a ribbon of steel would have to cross the country; the territory of the Blackfoot lay smack dab along the future line.
As the various groups of the Blackfoot Confederacy, Sarcee, and Stoney nations gathered, Commissioner Laird summarized the changing conditions on the plains:
“in a very few years, the buffalo will probably be all destroyed, and for this reason, the queen wishes to help you to live in the future in some other way. She wishes you to allow her white children to come and live on your land and raise cattle, and should you agree to this she will assist you to raise cattle and grain, and thus give you the means of living when the buffalo are no more. She will also pay you and your children money every year, which you can spend as you please.”
His speech essentially asked them to share their hunting grounds in return for some land, cows, potatoes, ammunition and a whopping $5.00 per year. In return, they would be signing a treaty that would essentially strip them of their rightful ownership of their traditional territories; territories won through generations of war, blood, and sacrifice.
Laird had little empathy for these first nations and often belittled claims that, to the Blackfeet, were not trivial matters.
One of the Blood Chiefs, Medicine Calf had already signed one treaty – with the Americans. He saw that treaty continually broken and the terms ignored. He spoke:
“the Great Mother sent you to this country, and we hope she will be good to us for many years… The Americans gave at first large bags of flour, sugar, and many blankets; the next year was only half the quantity, and the following year grew less and less, and now they give only a handful of flour.”
When he asked about compensation for firewood used by the police and settlers, Laird responded:
“Why, you Indians ought to pay us for sending these traders in fire water away and giving you security and peace, rather than we pay you for the timber used.”…
The negotiations were hard and contentious. The many leaders of the various nations all had different ideas of what would be necessary to sign a treaty.
According to one story, a white man spread a line of dollars on a table and informed Crowfoot that this was the currency by which the white man traded…not skins. Crowfoot took a handful of clay, made a ball, and placed it in the fire. He then looked to the white man and said: “Now put your money on the fire and see if it will last as long as the clay.”
When the white man responded that his money will burn, Crowfoot retorted:
“Oh your money is not as good as our land, is it? The wind will blow it away; the fire will burn it; water will rot it. Nothing will destroy our land. You don’t make a very good trade.”
The chief handed the white man a handful of sand and asked him to count the number of grains of sand. When the white man admitted that he couldn’t possibly count every grain, Crowfoot replied:
“Very well, our land is more valuable than your money. It will last forever. It will not perish as long as the sun shines and the water flows, and through all the years it will give life to men and animals, and therefore we cannot sell the land. It was put there by the Great Spirit and we cannot sell it because it does not really belong to us. You can count your money and burn it with a nod of a buffalo’s head, but only the Great Spirit can count the grains of sand and the blades of grass on these plains. As a present, we will give you anything you can take with you, but we cannot give you the land.”
Crowfoot showed that he truly understood the idea of ownership, but it is debatable as to whether he truly comprehended what the loss of all their land would mean to the Blackfoot.
As negotiations continued to drag on, there were rumours that the northern Piegan were pondering massacring the government representatives. Crowfoot was against any violence towards the commission.
The situation began to improve when the remainder of the leaders of the Blood tribe finally arrived at the treaty site. As the last of the great chiefs of the Confederacy arrived, even though the negotiations were difficult, the presence of the entire nation in one place helped raise spirits.
Crowfoot consulted a medicine man for whom he had great respect. When asked if he should sign a treaty, the response was:
“I want to hold you back because I am at the edge of the bank. My life is at its end. I hold you back because your life henceforth will be different from what it has been. Buffalo makes your body strong. What you will eat from this money will have your people buried all over these hills. You will be tied down, you will not wander the plains; the whites will take your land and fill it. You won’t have your own free will; the whites will lead you by a halter. That’s why I say don’t sign. But my life is old, so sign if you want to. Go ahead and make the treaty.”…
In the end, the various chiefs trusted Crowfoot to make the final decision as to whether they should sign.
Finally, Crowfoot rose to speak:
“While I speak, be kind and patient. I have to speak for my people, who are numerous, and who rely upon me to follow that course which in the future will tend to their good. The plains are large and wide. We are the children of the plains. It is our home, and the buffalo has been our food always. I hope you look upon the Blackfeet, Bloods, and Sarcees as your children now, and that you will be indulgent and charitable to them. They all expect me to speak now for them, and I trust the Great Spirit will put into their breasts to be a good people into the minds of the men, women and children, and their future generations…
The advice given me and my people has proved to be very good. If the police had not come to the country, where would we all be now? Bad men and whiskey were killing us so fast that very few, indeed, of us would have been left today. The police have protected us as the feathers of the bird protected from the frosts in winter. I wish them all good, and trust that all our hearts will increase in goodness from this time forward. I am satisfied. I will sign the treaty.”
With Crowfoot’s words, the other chiefs also made their mark upon the treaty. The next order of business was to decide where their reserves would be located.
Crowfoot believed that a single large reserve would help to keep their nation strong and strengthen their negotiating power with the whites. When there was no resistance he selected a long strip of land four miles wide extending some 320 km east into buffalo country.
While the whites wanted the Blackfoot to take up farming, Crowfoot could not see his people surviving by “scratching the land” to grow food. He picked rich hunting grounds, but poor land for farming.
Crowfoot was the first to sign. He expressed the concerns many of the Blackfoot had:
“Great Father! Take pity on me with regard to my country, with regard to the mountains, the hills and the valleys; with regard to the prairies, the forest and the waters; with regard to all the animals that inhabit them, and do not take them from myself and my children forever.”
After Crowfoot, all the other chiefs, true to their word to him, also made their mark on the treaty.
A missionary that was present at the signing, Father Scollen, was later asked if he thought the Blackfoot understood the magnitude of the document they had signed. He replied:
“Did these Indians, or do they now, understand the real nature of the treaty made between the Government and themselves in 1877? My answer to this question is unhesitatingly negative…
Crowfoot, who beyond a doubt, is considered the leading chief of the plains, did not seem to have a faint notion of the meaning of the treaty… All the other chiefs followed Crowfoot, and the substance of their speeches was that they agreed with him in all that he said…”
How could they understand the implications of the treaty? Interpreters whose job it was to explain the terms had no words that would help the chiefs truly understand the concept of giving up vast territories to be settled on tiny plots of land.
The Blackfoot would soon learn what signing this treaty meant.
For generations, they had relied on winter snows to force the bison towards their winter hunting grounds in the foothills. This year the snows didn’t come. Instead, winter fires on the prairies forced the bison to stay north of the Cypress Hills.
The Blackfoot, as they had always done, had no choice but to follow the herds. Soon they found themselves on the edge of their territory and within spitting distance of their traditional enemies the Crees, Assiniboines, and Sioux.
The winter was very difficult and starvation was a regular visitor to the camps. Sitting Bull once again visited Crowfoots camp and, while Crowfoot had no issues with the great chief, he advised that the Sioux stay away from their camps in such stressful times. He was worried that he would not be able to control his warriors.
While spring brought a few buffalo back to the plains, Crowfoot could see that the future would no longer see them as master of territories occupied by vast numbers of buffalo. The bison were fewer and fewer and the many competing nations were all desperate for the same few animals.
Crowfoot also learned that his friend Red Crow, chief of the Bloods, had decided, against the advice of Crowfoot, that he wanted a reserve farther south. This meant the joint reserve Crowfoot hoped for would not happen, and the single voice they might have with the government would now be partitioned.
Crowfoot felt betrayed by his friend Colonel Macleod who had approved the request by Red Crow. He knew that this would weaken the power of the Blackfoot and was sure there was treachery on the part of the commission.
The next winter was no better. The bison were scarce and the Blackfeet began to starve. Instead of bison, in desperation, they began to kill anything that was edible, whether it was a rabbit, ground squirrel, mouse, porcupine, or even badgers. If it had meat, it was fair game.
Pleas to the government who had previously promised to feed the nation fell on deaf ears. Over the winter, they began to eat the camp dogs, and in time, began to eat anything made of leather, from moccasins, leather bags, and any piece of animal skin that might contain nourishment.
The winter was terrible. In addition to the starvation, a party of 1,000 equally weak Crees camped just a few miles away. After a heated argument led to one of the Cree being killed, they finally moved on.
Finally, in July of 1879, Edgar Dewdney was appointed as Indian Commissioner. He heard the pleas of Three Bulls and the other Blackfeet and brought beef along with flour and tea to offer relief to the starving. As he reported:
“On arriving there, I found about 1300 Indians in a very destitute condition and many on the verge of starvation. Young men who were known to be Stout and hearty fellows some six months ago, were quite emaciated and so weak they could hardly work; the old people and widows, who, with their children live on the charity of the younger and more prosperous, had nothing, and many a pitiable tale was told of the misery they had endured.”
That summer, the Blackfoot were advised by Dewdney and Colonel Macleod that many bison were being seen around the Cypress Hills. The Blackfoot followed their advice and sent the old and sick to Fort Macleod to be cared for by the police.
As it turns out, those headed to the fort would fare far better than the warriors that headed out to hunt as their forefathers had done before them.
As they approached Cypress Hills, Crowfoot met his foster brother Three Bulls who told him the animals that had previously been there had now moved out of the area. American hide hunters had set fires south of the border to prevent the normal northward migration of the buffalo, trapping them south of the border.
While Crowfoot had never taken his people south of the American border before, the southern Piegan had always hunted there. Crowfoot had no choice but to head south into unknown territory. Unfortunately, his reputation preceded him and his arrival was heralded by a scalding news story in the American media:
“Crowfoot has always been the leader of noted murderers, and is responsible for the death of more than one emigrant and prospector, yet this red butcher has been the pet of the Mounted Police ever since the latter arrived in the country”
It hurts me to share quotes like this, but it’s necessary to show the difference between Canadian and American views towards First Nations. At the same time, it was the Canadian government, with whom the Blackfoot had signed treaties with the promise of fair treatment and supplies of food, that had forced them to be there in the first place.
The Americans resented the presence of so-called Canadian Indians and they had a good reason. Dewdney, in private correspondence, admitted as much:
“I advised them strongly to go and gave them some provisions to take them off. They continued to follow the buffalo further and further south until they reached the main herd and there they remained… I consider their remaining away saved the government $100,000 at least.”
Americans saw their territory swarmed by natives of every affiliation, from Blackfeet to Sarcee to Gros Ventres, and on and on. Each of these nations had no other choice, except starvation. The bison were quickly vanishing and these were all people of the bison.
In addition to the scorn and risk of cavalry attacks from travelling south of the border, suddenly they were back in the lands of the whiskey trader. No sooner were their bellies full, did the whiskey wagons arrive in their camps.
Suddenly, in addition to the whiskey, there was a new voice trying to whisper into their heads, a Metis by the name of Louis Riel.
Riel had been a leader of the Metis when confederation transferred the lands of the Red River Settlement to the fledgeling Canadian government. He understood that the transfer of lands would be done with little consultation to the first nations and Metis that were already living there.
In 1869, when the government sent surveyors to partition and run the area, Riel led his people in a rebellion. The government sent out soldiers and Riel fled to the U.S. to escape prosecution where he continued to promote mixed-blood rights.
His resistance led to the founding of the province of Manitoba, and despite living in exile, he was elected three times to the federal government in absentia.
Also in his absence, his colleague Father Nol Ritchot, managed to stare down John A. Macdonald and his Conservatives in negotiations and have the province of Manitoba established in May of 1870 while Riel was still in hiding.
It was just a tiny postage stamp in terms of its present size. While merely one-eighteenth the size of modern-day Manitoba, it accomplished its goals of protecting the Red River settlement and the Metis for whom Riel had fought.
Riel was gone from the political scene in Manitoba, but he was still working to coordinate a much larger rebellion that would take control of the Northwest Territories. While in Montana, Riel met with Crowfoot. As Crowfoot described the meeting:
“He wanted me to join with all the Sioux, and the Crees, and half-breeds. The idea was to have a general uprising and capture the North-West, and hold it for the Indian race and the Métis [mixed-bloods]. We were to meet at Tiger Hills, in Montana; we were to have a government of our own. I refused, but the others were willing…”
Riel had persuasive words, but Crowfoot could see they led only to ruin for his people. Like Sitting Bull a few years earlier, he was able to see past the passion and the fervour to the ruinous results.
Somehow, despite being starved into another country, he still had confidence in the Mounted Police. In his conversations with Riel, there was an interpreter present, a false-priest by the name of Jean L’Heureux. While L’Heureux had never been ordained as a priest, he roamed the plains preaching the gospel.
Despite this official stature as a false-priest, others like Father Lacombe hired him as an interpreter due to the very close relationship with the first nations of the plains, in particular, the Blackfoot. He was a confidant of Crowfoot and he described Riel’s words:
“I soon learned the whole plan of the affair, which was nothing less than the invasion and taking possession of the North-West Territories, with the help of a general uprising of all the Indian tribes, united to the half-breeds… That R…was to be governor, and Riel the first minister of his cabinet, where a seat was to be given to the Indian chief who, with his people, would help the half-breeds most in the contemplated invasion…
Riel planned for his allies to meet at Tiger Hills and from there to march on the Canadians. Unfortunately, the Americans in whose territory Crowfoot’s people were currently residing, also heard these stories of war parties.
Like Sitting Bull, Crowfoot didn’t want anything to do with Riel’s rebellion and soon Riel realized that with the Americans aware of his plans, it was best for him to make tracks for the Judith Basin in Montana and talk no more…for now of rebellion.
Oddly enough, Sitting Bull also met with Crowfoot in Montana. He had slipped south of the border as he had done numerous times to hunt. His people, like the Blackfoot, were also forced south of the Medicine Line in the quest for bison. He wanted no quarrel with the Blackfoot as he knew that he needed to return to Canada as soon as possible.
He said to Crowfoot:
“my children will be your children and your’s mine. From now on we will never fight again and we will be on the same side at all times.”
He even named one of his children Crowfoot.
Unfortunately, within days, a Sioux war party raided Crowfoot’s camp and stole numerous horses. The two men never spoke again.
While Sitting Bull’s people were officially still in Canada, the situation for them got increasingly worse. Prime Minister John A Macdonald didn’t like having the Sioux warrior on Canadian soil and he believed that Major James Walsh of the fort that bore his name in the Cypress Hills, was too lenient with Sitting Bull.
However, Walsh had gained a great respect for the old Chief, as long as he kept his people peaceful. Macdonald had Walsh transferred to Fort Qu’Appelle, some 250 km distant. He was replaced by an officious inspector Lief N.F. (‘Paddy’) Crozier. He was instructed to convince Sitting Bull to go back to the U.S.
Finally, in July of 1881, Sitting Bulls remaining followers rode south and surrendered at Fort Buford on the Yellowstone River. In the meantime, Walsh had taken vacation time and travelled to Chicago to meet with an American Indian Agent with whom he was friends. He pleaded for fair treatment for the Sioux.
Sitting Bull was imprisoned for 20 months at Fort Randall in South Dakota and was freed in May of 1883. The following year, while touring Canada and the U.S. he met Annie Oakley. The Minnesotan sharpshooter deeply impressed the old chief and he adopted her as his daughter, giving her the name “Little Sure Shot”. She continued to use that name throughout her career.
He joined the Wild West Show of Buffalo Bill Cody in 1885 but only stayed for four months before returning to his reserve at Standing Rock. Around this time, a new native religious movement called the ghost dance became popular. The military was fearful of it and became convinced that Sitting Bull was an instigator. They ordered him arrested and during the scuffle, the old chief, along with numerous other Sioux, were killed. The plains had lost another great chief and songs of mourning filled the air at Standing Rock.
Like Crowfoot, Sitting Bull was a man trapped in time. He was from a once proud and powerful nation that saw his way of life destroyed. While he chose a different path than Crowfoot, he did so with the conviction that he was doing what was best for his people.
Next week, I’ll finish the story of Crowfoot and the Blackfoot as they are eventually forced back to Canada amidst Cavalry threats, sickness, and starvation.
Yellow Ladyslipper Orchid
A few episodes back, in episode 60, I talked about the Calypso orchid and how it tricked bumblebee queens into pollinating it without providing any nectar reward. This week, I want to look at another related orchid, the yellow ladyslipper orchid.
Orchids are a very old family of plants, and along with the dandelion or daisy family, represent the two largest plant families on the planet. There are more than 28,000 different orchid species on the planet today. Each one has evolved a slightly different strategy to attract their specific pollinator.
Few plant families have diversified as much as the orchids in order to attract a very specific insect to act as courier to transplant pollen from one flower to another. Orchids are also part of the major plant group called monocotyledon. This includes most of the grasses and sedges, along with lilies and irises.
Monocots, as they are commonly referred, usually have grass-like leaves, with the veins running parallel to the leaf margin. Their petals are also usually arranged in multiples of threes, for instance, three or six petals.
Most flowers reward pollinators with treats of nectar or pollen. Pollen is one of nature’s most perfect foods. It contains everything that a honey bee needs to survive: sugar, proteins, enzymes, minerals and vitamins. The nectar is used to make honey to feed the larvae in the hive.
So many plants have evolved specifically to provide one or both of these as a reward for pollinators visiting the plant and taking a bit of pollen to another plant to assist in cross-pollination.
Across the orchid family, there are both nectar rewarding species and food deceptors like the Calypso which trick the bee into visiting but leave them hungry when they leave.
Most orchids have three petals and three sepals. Unlike most plants though, where the sepals are usually nondescript, in orchids, often the sepals look just like the petals. This is particularly true of the ladyslippers.
The yellow ladyslipper has three sepals that resemble the petals. One rises vertically above the plant and the other two fall behind and below the flower.
It also has three petals, although the third one is modified into the pouch so distinctive in ladyslipper orchids. The other two petals, which resemble the sepals, tend two twist and curve forward as if they were the shoelaces that would tie the slipper onto the imaginary foot was this really a slipper.
Above the pouch is a yellow triangular structure used to guide the bees into the pouch. Just in case they need further direction, there are purple markings that literally point down on the lip. To the bee, this means “follow this arrow to get pollen and/or nectar”. Unfortunately for the bee, it gets neither.
Like the Calypso, the yellow ladyslipper doesn’t produce any nectar for the production of honey. That’s alright, then a feed of pollen will do just fine. Unfortunately for the bee, the pollen of these orchids is all packed together into a single sticky mass. This allows a single bee visit to produce thousands of tiny seeds.
When the bee follows the arrow on the lip into the pouch, it becomes trapped. Inside the pouch though, there’s another series of purple lines that guide the bee towards the rear of the flower where there are two exit points for bees that are the right size. Too large and they may find themselves trapped in the pouch.
Tiny angular hairs also serve to nudge the bee in the right direction towards these exits…oh and yah…the orchids reproductive organs. First, it passes the stigma or female part of the plant. If the bee has visited another orchid previously, the sticky pollen mass will be deposited here. Then, just before it exits the flower, an additional pollen mass will be placed on its back where it can’t access it for feeding purposes. It will just stick there on the hopes that the bee gets duped once again.
Without a pollen or nectar reward, there is little to motivate bees to keep visiting these orchids. That’s why allowing a single visit to produce thousands of seeds is a good strategy – it makes every visit count.
Why do bees come back? In part because of the seductive fragrance of the flower. It resembles the bees own pheromones. In addition, any bees that have already visited and escaped, leave their scent as well. This also serves to attract other unwitting bees.
Once the flower is pollinated, it will produce a hard, vertical pod that contains thousands of tiny, wind-dispersed seeds.
Once the seeds are released, for most plants the story would end. They would hopefully find their way to a place with good soil and germination would take place. For orchids, the story is not quite that simple.
The seeds of the yellow ladyslipper are tiny and have very little in the way of food reserves. All plants need help in obtaining nutrients from the soil. Their roots need nitrogen and phosphorous to promote growth. Specialized fungi in the soil called mycorrhizal fungi are able to make these minerals available to the plants in return for a little of the sugar produced by the leaves.
The fungi wraps itself around and, in some cases, within the roots. The plant provides sugar in return for these essential nutrients.
Some 90% of all plants on the planet rely on these beneficial fungi for their growth. There are thousands of species of mycorrhizal fungi, and for most plants, they are not too fussy as to which species their roots associate with. They have sugar to trade, and the fungi have nitrogen. You give me yours and I’ll give you mine.
Some plants, as in the case of orchids though, are very particular. The yellow ladyslipper only associates with a small number of fungi species. It also needs their help to even germinate. Each of the seeds of the orchid are tiny and lack any food reserves. They need to land on just the right soil, which contains just the right fungi.
Before they can germinate, the fungi have to wrap themselves around the seeds and provide not just nitrogen at this stage but also sugars. The plant seed has none so the fungus has to sustain the seeds until they can germinate. Essentially, at this time, the plant is parasitic to the fungus as it’s not providing any sugars in return for the nourishment it is taking.
Later, as the fungus feeds the seed until it germinates and grows, a period that can take years, The plant will begin to reciprocate and provide sugars to the fungus. In most plant relationships. Essentially, the relationship varies between one of parasitism and one of mutual benefit.
Yellow ladyslippers also take hiatuses at different times in their lifespan where they won’t sprout at all for several years. During these dormant times, it will, once again, rely on the fungi for nourishment.
Unfortunately, this intense reliance on very specific soil fungi means that you can’t transplant ladyslippers. The plants produce thousands of seeds specifically because the chance of germination is very rare. Only those few seeds that land in the right place, which contains the right fungal partner, have any chance of survival.
It’s important to think of orchids as a kind of compound species. The flower is only one component of the living plant. The fungi is intricately wound around and within its roots. One cannot exist without the other.
If you see people tempted to dig them up or pick them, please let them know just how fragile these flowers are and that picking them today may mean that we never again get the pleasure of seeing another flower in that location.
The more I learn about orchids and the orchid family, the more impressed I am. They are one of the most uniquely diversified group of plants on the planet. Because most don’t offer nectar to their pollinators, they have to develop innovative ways of attracting them and making sure that each visit counts.
And with that, it’s time to wrap this episode up. Remember that Ward Cameron Enterprises is your source for all things Rocky Mountain. We offer nature, hiking, step-on, and photography guides to make sure your visit is a memorable one. Expert guides share the stories behind the scenery.
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