This story was originally published by High Country News and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

Arizona’s rarest orchid, when not in bloom, resembles a blade of grass. It vanishes easily in the lush greenery of the Canelo Hills Cienega Preserve—even to the eyes of the botanists who plant it.

On a mild April morning, after a decade of preparation, a group of scientists gathered at a desert wetland cradled in southern Arizona’s hills to reintroduce a federally endangered orchid. Aside from the researchers’ chatter, the only sounds were water trickling from a spring and boots squelching through mud.

Steve Blackwell, conservation biologist at the Desert Botanical Garden (DBG), ventured into the wetland, using tussocks of grass as stepping-stones. He wanted to see if a small test plot of orchids planted months before had survived. He returned at a run, fists pumping the air. “I found one!”

The rest of the team, made up of orchid experts from DBG and the North American Orchid Conservation Center (NAOCC), followed him to a soil moisture sensor stuck into the boggy ground. He pulled aside sedges and grasses to reveal a thin, grass-like leaf.

“We did it, guys,” NAOCC technician Hope Brooks said.

“Now we just gotta do 360 more,” Blackwell replied.

“Desert wetland” sounds like a contradiction. Known regionally as ciénegas, they’re pockets of green in an arid landscape, fed by freshwater springs. They’re among the rarest habitats in the Southwestern United States, making up just a tiny fraction of the landscape but home to a vast array of species.

The Canelo Hills ladies’-tresses, one of the most endangered orchids in the United States, contributes to that diversity. But only a few hundred remain in the wild, and none had been seen at the Canelo Hills Cienega Preserve, where the species was first documented in a scientific publication, since the early 2000s.

In 2020, the US Fish and Wildlife Service asked DBG botanists whether they could grow the orchid from seed. “I’m like, ‘Yeah, sure I can,’” Blackwell said, chuckling at his own confidence. “I love getting these problems that are difficult and then trying to work through them.”

The first challenge was locating the remaining wild........

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