Species Orchid, Cypripedium, Lesser Yellow Lady's Slipper

This is considered one of the ladyslippers that adapts most easily to cultivation.

Two varieties of this species are popul...Read Morear in cultivation: var. pubescens has flowers several times as large as var. parviflorum. Both are among the most popular of ladyslippers in cultivation, and both adapt better than most to the hot humid summers of the southeastern US.

The common name for this species is yellow ladyslipper. C. parviflorum var. parviflorum is the small or lesser yellow ladyslipper, and C. parviflorum var. pubescens is the large or greater yellow ladyslipper. The yellow in the flowers of this species is a bright yellow.

This species has become rare or threatened throughout much of its former range. This is largely due to the illegal wild collection of plants for garden use. Wild-collected plants are usually sold as "nursery propagated", and rarely survive for long.

According to Bill Cullina, 99% of the plants for sale as nursery-propagated are in reality wild-collected. Blooming-sized plants offered for under $35 are certainly wild-collected.

Reliable sources of nursery-propagated Cyprepediums: http://botanyboy.org/where-to-buy-lady-slipper-orchids-onlin...

There are now many hybrid cypripediums which are just as beautiful and much easier and more vigorous garden plants, and which you can be sure are not taken from the wild.

Cypripedium parviflorum is one of the best growing orchids in my garden in Tyrol Austria. Here it blooms together with Aquilegia canaden...Read Moresis close to my rock garden.

Nice native plant growing like a weed in our wetlands. Doesn't like mechanical disturbance or transplanting.