In the deep forests of Crater Lake there grow a number of oddly-colored, leafless plants, which look like phantoms in the shadows. Their secretiveness betrays that they are bent upon no honest business, and they are, indeed, the robbers of the plant kingdom. Possessing no leaves of their own with which to manufacture food, they prey upon their more industrious neighbors, or live ghoulishly upon the decaying vegetation.

Most of the leafless plants are members of the Heath Family, which includes such common plants as the Manzanitas, the Heathers, the Rhododendrons, and the Madrone, beside their degenerate kin. The "Stick-candy" (Allotropa virgata) is very noticeable by virtue of its red and white stripped stem, bearing a dense spike of flowers of the same colors. It looks like nothing in the world so much as a barber pole, whose gaudy lines have been straightened out, and set vertically.

A close but less gaudy relative of the stick-candy is the "Pine Drops" (Pterospora andromedea). Again we find an erect plant, surmounted by a dense spike of flowers, but this plant varies from tawny to red, and is completely covered with short sticky hairs. The flowers are myriads of little silent bells, which might have been grafted on from some Manzanita or Heather. While the Stick-candy seldom reaches more than a foot in height, the Pine Drops may ascend as much as three or four feet.

The "Pine Sap" is a smooth, fleshy little plant, colored red, yellow or orange, an bearing a raceme of beautiful, waxy flowers of the same hue. It is only two or three inches high, but its brilliant yellow or red tones render it quite conspicuous when one does chance upon it. The Pine Sap is closely related to the "Indian Pipe", which bears a number of pure white, one-flowered shoots in dense clusters, and is quite common elsewhere in the state, but is apparently not found in the Park.

That most aristocratic family of flowers, the Orchid Family, also contributes two of its black-sheep to this eerie group. These are the "Coral-roots", which are probably the most common and conspicuous members of this band. The "Merten's Coral-root" (Corallorhiza mertensiana) is a rich brownish-purple spire, studded with flowers or the typical Orchid form. The "Spotted Coral-root" (Corallorhiza maculata) is usually lighter in color, affecting a yellowish brown, and its flowers each bear a white lip, spattered with irregular purple blotches. These orchids live upon decaying humus, and to utilize it most effectively, they have developed a much-branched system of fleshy roots, simulating a heap of interwoven grey coral.

Growing among the Stone-crops, or sedums, in the crevices of the rocks, little tubular, violet-tinged flowers may sometimes be discovered. The stalks are yellowish, and a few shriveled bracts are all the remain of the green leaves that may have adorned and nourished them before they strayed from the unattractive path of independence. This is the "One-flowered Broom-rape" (Thalesia uniflora), which is an out-and-out parasite, and must derive all its nourishment at the expense of its more self-reliant neighbors.

Since most of these plants have relatives who can, and do, manufacture their own food, it is probable that these phantom flowers also once lived entirely by their own industry. But the competition for light and air was too keen in the deep arboreal shade, so they resorted to trickery. Their wiles proved effective, and they throve, but the stump of the flabby parasite is upon them, and they have lost forever the ability to produce green leaves and live self-reliantly.