Mark Carlson and his miniature Australian shepherd, Tressie, on a bench overlooking the Looking Glass River in Laingsburg, Michigan. Tressie is named for a kind of orchid. Image: Karen Hopper Usher
By Karen Hopper Usher
LAINGSBURG, Mich. — The tiny white-and-pink flowers made Mark Carlson’s heart pound. His 30-year quest to find and photograph the small round-leaved orchis (Amerorchis rotundifolia) was finally over.
Mark Carlson searched for the small round-leaved orchis for 30 years. Image: Mark S. Carlson
But he couldn’t believe how tough it was going to be to get the picture just right.
Carlson, a 58-year-old professional nature photographer who lives in Laingsburg in central Michigan, is on a mission to photograph that state’s best orchids. Common or plain orchids and ugly backgrounds don’t interest him.
“I don’t make a picture if the background doesn’t present itself,” he said.
Still, he estimates he’s photographed at least 50 of Michigan’s native orchid species. That’s only seven fewer than the state hosts, making it the most orchid-rich state after only Florida and New York, according to Anton Reznicek, the assistant director of the University of Michigan herbarium.
Carlson’s quest has taken him all over the state. On the day 10 years ago in the Upper Peninsula’s Schoolcraft County when he finally found the small round-leaved orchis, thick foliage gave him pause.
“I want to make a pretty picture, but oh, it’s a bad situation,” Carlson recalled.
The small round-leaved orchis were deep into the shrubs and the fen, a marshy terrain.
“You gotta get wet,” he said.
After “teasing” away twigs and branches– he says he never pulls anything out — Carlson made a picture he liked.
Then he did something he says he’ll never do again.
He told people where to find the flowers.
Now they’re gone from that location.
“They got basically trampled to death,” he said.
Carlson blames other nature photographers.
Just one photographer probably won’t hurt orchids, said Scott Namestnik, a botanist with Orbis Environmental Consulting in South Bend, Indiana. But several photographers visiting the same site over and over again can indeed trample the flowers.
Mark Carlson makes a living selling his nature photography, including photos of Michigan’s native orchid species. The image on the coffee mug is one of his oldest shots of pink lady slippers. Image: Karen Hopper Usher
Poachers are a bigger threat, Namestnik said. And so is climate change.
“Orchids are canaries in the coal mine,” said Ron McHatton, the science and education officer at the American Orchid Society.
Orchids are accustomed to narrow climates and temperatures. When temperatures heat up too fast in the spring or don’t get cold enough in winter, “it’s an open question as to what will happen,” he said.
Michigan has so many orchid species because it has lots of kinds of terrain and microclimates caused by the Great Lakes, said Doug Pearsall, a senior scientist at the Nature Conservancy.
McHatton said there’s no succinct definition of an orchid. A common definition is that orchids are “perfect” flowers with male and female reproductive elements fused into a so-called column. Sometimes the column is only partially fused.
Other clues are a fine, dust-like seed, six floral segments, and monocot seedlings (seeds with just one embryonic leaf).
The rarest orchid in Michigan is probably the Eastern prairie fringed orchid, Namestnik said. The federally threatened flower is found in bogs, fens and prairies but is becoming rarer due to habitat damage.
And Carlson has found it.
The Eastern prairie-fringed orchid is among the rarest in Michigan. Image: Mark S. Carlson
“Over the years, I’ve personally witnessed the decline of this one-time common orchid,” Carlson wrote on Facebook.
Carlson is drawn to orchids because of their sensitivity to their environment.
“The rarity, the scarcity, the exotic, intricate detail and shape,” he said.
Mark Carlson fell in love with orchids when his mentor Larry West took him to see pink lady’s slippers in 1980. Image: Mark S. Carlson
When his mentor, the late Larry West of Mason, introduced him to orchids around 1980, Carlson said he was hooked right away.
West took Carlson to a bog, which was like walking on a waterbed through dense brush, he said.
When they came across pink lady slippers, it was the most exciting thing he’d ever seen.
“Mother nature is protecting these treasures,” he said about the slog through the bog and the brush. “And that’s part of the fascination.”
Mark Carlson prefers to photograph the state’s “showiest” orchids. Pictured: Spotted coral-root orchid. Image: Mark S. Carlson
Carlson has two more orchid species to photograph on his quest to photograph Michigan’s rarest and most beautiful native ones. When he’s done, he wants to publish a book.
He’ll forego flowers that are very similar to other orchids he’s already found. Rattlesnake orchids, he says, are all pretty similar.
“I’m after the showy ones,” he said.
The nodding pogonia and the whorled pogonia are his white whales.
The nodding pogonia is extremely rare and is found in mixed hardwood forests, Pearsall said.
The whorled pogonia is found in “older hardwood stands, often on slopes near small streams,” according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
The calypso bulbosa is considered by some to be among the state’s most beautiful native orchids. Image: Mark S. Carlson
That’s more information than Carlson himself will share when he completes his task. After his experience with the small round-leaved orchis, he limits the information he gives out. He’ll say which county he was in when he photographed the orchids, but doesn’t want to share information about habitat.
“When I find these last two remaining orchids, I’m not going to say anything,” he said, “I’m just going to show them.”
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Find Carlson on the web: markscarlson.com