Any guess?

[Holger Kreft]

Fred:

I am not familiar with the North American flora. But as far as I know,
there is no species of that family in the US.

But, you might want to try the general family description of
Balanophoraceae on:
http://www.mobot.org/MOBOT/research/APweb/orders/santalalesweb2.htm#Balanophoraceae
A picture of a representative of that family from Ecuador:
www.uni-bonn.de/~uzsmxn/plant_galleries/images_yasuni/Ombrophytum_peruvianum.jpg

According to your description, it is pretty likely to be a parasitic /
saprophytic vascular plant. Check with the Flora of North America. There
are not many higher plants like that.
( http://www.efloras.org/flora_page.aspx?flora_id=1
http://hua.huh.harvard.edu/FNA/ )

Cheers,

Holger

Frederick W. Schueler schrieb:

>Michael Vincent wrote:
>
>
>>Perhaps Balanophora?
>>
>>
>
>* why was I allowed to grow up ignorant of this incredible genus? Can
>someone point me to a webpage that consists of more than excalmations of
>amazement about it?
>
>thanks,
>
>fred.
>------------------------------------------------------------
>           Bishops Mills Natural History Centre
>Frederick W. Schueler, Aleta Karstad, Jennifer Helene Schueler
>      RR#2 Bishops Mills, Ontario, Canada K0G 1T0
>   on the Smiths Falls Limestone Plain 44* 52'N 75* 42'W
>     (613)258-3107 <bckcdb at istar.ca> http://pinicola.ca
>------------------------------------------------------------
>subscribe to the Eastern Ontario Natural History list-serve at
>http://mail.thenaturejournal.com/mailman/listinfo/naturelist_thenaturejournal.com
>------------------------------------------------------------
>
>
>

--
______________________________________________________________
Dipl. Biol. Holger Kreft (PhD-student)
BIOMAPS Working Group
Phone:  ++49 - (0) 228 736333
Email:  hk at uni-bonn.de
private homepage: http://www.uni-bonn.de/~uzsxeg

Nees-Institute for Biodiversity of Plants
Director: Prof. W. Barthlott
Meckenheimer Allee 170
53115 Bonn
Germany
Phone: 0049- (0)228-732526
Fax :  0049- (0)228-733120
www.nees.uni-bonn.de
______________________________________________________________