Neil Healdsburg — 1960 The Hammer Orchid

“The Hammer Orchids resemble the female Thynnids wasp.” Ryan tells Neil, “Females are flightless; when the season for love dawns, the Thynnids climbs to the top of a plant. She sends pheromones — which is the perfume of love — into the air, waiting for some male Lochinvar Thynnids to swoop in and fly away with her, mating in midair.”

“What,” Neil asks, “is a Lochinvar? Is it a kind of orchid?”

“No,” Ryan laughs, “It’s a lover-boy, a Casanova, someone ladies like.”

“Like you,” Neil asks? “Mom says you are irresistible — to a certain kind of girl.”

Ryan laughs again, uneasily this time.

“Hammer Orchids perch on a stem’s tip looking like a demure, shy female. They too waft pheromones into the air. Drawn by scent, deceived by sight, Thynnids males spend their love on eggless petals.”

“How come they don’t die off then?” Neil asks. He has already learned about extinction, already knows that it takes at least two — sometime a whole flock — to keep a species healthy and alive.