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| Distribution | Present over most of the northern Mountains, south to Yancey and Burke counties; but scarce and local in the southern Mountains. Oddly lacking specimens from heavily worked Buncombe County, as well as fairly well studied Haywood, Swain, Macon, and Jackson counties. There are a good handful of iNaturalist photos of this species from counties where not documented by collections; a few have been included here, but not all, as it is very difficult to know if any of these refer to planted areas.
This is a Northern species ranging from southern Canada, south to CT and WI, and then in the Appalachians to northern GA. | |
| Abundance | Uncommon and somewhat local in the northern half of the Mountains, and rare and local in the southern portions (counties bordering GA and SC). The NCNHP formerly had the species on its Watch List, yet still have its State Rank at S2, which necessitates a Watch List or tracked status. The website editors feel that there are enough records across the mountains to move the rank to S2S3, if not to S3; these suggested ranks thus indicate that Watch List is no longer needed. | |
| Habitat | This is an oddly localized species, for reasons not obvious, considering its reasonably common habitats. It grows at middle and high elevations in thin soil, often in rocky forests, glades, and forest openings. At a few places it grows on circumneutral soils, such as in Clay County, but most sites seem to be in acidic soils. |
| Phenology | Blooms from April to June, and fruits from June to September. | |
| Identification | Though hardly numerous in the NC mountains, when encountered in bloom it cannot fail to be noticed. It has a very short stem, often reaching only 3-6 inches high. Lower leaves are bract-like and hardly noticeable, but the few stem leaves are near the top of the short stem, and these are thick, dark green, widely elliptic, and about 1.2 inches long and not quite as wide. The leaves are shiny and almost appear to be evergreen. Just above these leaves grow only about 2-3 quite odd yet large deep rose flowers, consisting of a corolla tube (with a bushy tip) and single flaring petals to each side, each quite rounded. Each flower averages about 1-1.5 inches wide, quite "large" for the dwarf stature of the plant. Not surprisingly, many to most recent references have pulled the species out of Polygala into the genus Polygaloides.
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| Taxonomic Comments | See Identification.
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| Other Common Name(s) | Gay-wings, Bird-on-the-wing, Flowering Wintergreen | |
| State Rank | S2 [S2S3] | |
| Global Rank | G5 | |
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| US Status | | |
| USACE-agcp | FACU link |
| USACE-emp | FACU link |
