Kalmia

These showy species have the largest (and most open, saucer-shaped) flowers of any of our native Ericaceae. The corolla (except in albinos) is pink, and as it opens each anther is held in a little pocket (visible externally on the buds). The filament is therefore arched backward, under tension. When a visiting insect trips the filament, the anther springs loose from its pocket and the insect receives a shower of pollen.

1. Leaves mostly in whorls of 3, distinctly petioled, green beneath; inflorescences axillary, the branches terminating in leafy shoots; calyx and pedicels glandular.

K. angustifolia

1. Leaves opposite, sessile or subsessile, strongly whitened (by dense minute puberulence) beneath; inflorescences terminal; calyx and pedicels eglandular.

K. polifolia