Herbs, perennial, terrestrial, winter dormant. Roots long, slender, hairy with mycorrhizae. Stems simple, hollow, fleshy, smooth, glaucous. Leaves (2-)5(-6), appearing whorled. Inflorescences terminal; bracts absent. Flowers 1-2, resupinate, erect, yellowish green to white, yellow, and purple, subsessile to pedicellate; sepals of same color, linear-oblanceolate to lanceolate, of equal size; petals oblanceolate, elliptic-obovate, or elliptic-lanceolate, enclosing column; lip apically 3-lobed, lateral lobes triangular, margins involute; callus forming fleshy medial crest; column white, apex denticulate; anther operculate; pollinia 2, hinged, soft, mealy; rostellum obscure; pollen in tetrads, granular; ovary green, slender. Fruits capsules, commonly persistent through following growing season, erect, ellipsoid-cylindric, dehiscent in fall. Seeds 1.2 × 0.2 mm. x = 9.

Sep and lateral pet evidently unlike, the sep linear, elongate, the pet shorter and relatively wider; lip not declined, bearing a prominent median ridge from the base to beyond the middle, 3-lobed, the lateral lobes 2/3 as long as the whole lip, or longer, upturned at the margin, the terminal lobe short, broad, inconspicuously erose; column extending forward over the lip, its terminal anther deflexed; pollinia 2; nectar wanting; perennial from a cluster of fleshy-fibrous roots, the erect glabrous, hollow stem bearing a single whorl of usually 5 lvs near the summit and 1(2) large terminal fl. Only 2 spp.

Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.

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