When I was mowing, I spotted some Indian Pipes, which are also called Ghost Plant, Ghost Pipe, Ghost Flower or Corpse Plant. I don’t see them every year and because it has no chlorophyll and doesn’t depend on photosynthesis, they can grow in dark forests. As it is unable to obtain energy from sunlight, it is a parasitic plant that uses a fungi to tap into tree roots for its nutrients.
Indian Pipes Blooming
More bare ground is peeking through as the warmer temperature overnight is helping to melt the snow, but still no wildflower to be seen for a while – pink or white ones. The Indian Pipe flower would be hard to spot amongst the snow.
Indian Pipes in White
This odd looking wildflower called Indian Pipe, or Corpse Plant, contains no chlorophyll and therefore has to “borrow” or take nutrients from other sources. Its roots tap into the root-like threads of fungus, which the fungus tap into tree roots. The tree gives nutrients to the fungus and the fungus gives nutrients to the tree but Indian Pipes don’t give anything back and actually a parasite to both the tree and fungus.
I spotted a clump of them just peeking out of the ground with a couple that were further along. The flower head is bent down to prevent rain from getting in, but as the plant gets older, it raises the head to attract insects to pollinate. The blossom inside turns pink when fertilized and as the plant matures, the head is straight up. Eventually the plant turns black as it matures even more.
Odd Looking Wildflower
Normally you think of flowers being colorful, like the multi-colored chicken I posted yesterday, but some flowers didn’t get the memo about being colorful. Even white daisies with their yellow centers are colorful but this Indian Pipe has no chlorophyll and gets its nutrients through a mutually beneficial relationship with a fungus in the soil where it grows. And since it doesn’t need sunlight, it can grow in deep wooded areas.
Because of its lack of chlorophyll, it’s sometimes called ghost plant or corpse plant. The nodding flower pushed through the soil with the flower already formed and when the blossom is pollinated, the blossom straightens to an upright position. It turns black when it dies and then to me it looks like a burnt wooden match stick.
Indian pipe survives not from photosynthesis, but by stealing carbon from a mycorrhizal fungus living in the root zone of trees. Mycorrhizal fungi are symbiotic organisms that vastly increase the absorptive surface area of a tree’s root system and aid in uptake of specific nutrients and the tree responds by providing carbohydrates for the fungus.
By chemically mimicking the tree’s root system, the Indian pipe causes the mycorrhizal fungi to attach to its roots in a kind of biological identity theft. The fungus mycelium receives sugars produced by the trees from photosynthesis which some then gets passed to the ‘thieving’ Indian Pipes.
The unique requirements and epiparasitic ways make it all but impossible to cultivate in a garden or to transplant them.
Indian Pipe (or Ghost Plant or Corpse Plant)
