Kansas Wildflowers and Grasses - Yellow lady's-slipper

YELLOW LADY'S-SLIPPER

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Cypripedium parviflorum Salisb.

[=Cypripedium calceolus L. var. parviflorum (Salisb. ) Fernald]

Johnson County, Kansas

Perennial

Height: 8-12 inches

Family: Orchidaceae - Orchid Family

Flowering Period: April, May

Also Called:

Yellow moccasin-flower.

Stems:

Plants glandular-pubescent; from rhizomes. Flowering stems erect, green, simple.

Leaves:

3-6, cauline, alternate; blade ovate-lanceolate, 2 to 8.2 inches long, .8 to 4.2 inches wide, parallel-veined, margins entire, base narrowed to sheathing petiole, apex acute.

Inflorescences:

Terminal, flowers 1-2; bracts green, conspicuous, ovate-lanceolate, 1.4 to 4.2 inches long, .2 to 1 inch wide, apex acuminate; pedicel .2- to 1.2 inch.

Flowers:

Sepals 3, green to greenish brown or yellow, usually minutely reddish brown-spotted, petal-like, spreading, abaxial sepal ovate-lanceolate, .4 to 3.2 inches long, .4 to .8 inch wide, usually undulate, not twisted, lateral sepals fused, .8 to 3 inches long, .25 to .7 inch wide; petals 3, distinct, abaxial petal modified as a lip that is different from other petals in form and color; lateral petals green to greenish brown or yellow, spreading, linear-lanceolate, 1.2 to 3.6 inches long, .12 to .5 inch wide, often spirally twisted or undulate, sometimes flat; lip yellow, inside often purple spotted or veined, rarely with reddish spots on outer external surface, inflated, slipper-like, .6 to 2.2 inches; stamens 2, fused to style and stigmas to form column subtended by lip; pistil 1, 3-carpellate; stigmas usually 3-lobed.

Fruits:

Capsules, erect, ellipsoid, .8 to1.4 inch; seeds numerous, dust-like, wind-dispersed.

Habitat:

Rich, oak-hickory and maple-basswood forests

Distribution:

East 1/5 of Kansas

Origin:

Native

Uses:

Native Americans steeped the roots and took the tea for nervousness, lack of energy, colds, and flu.

Comments:

Cypripedium, Aphrodite and foot, alluding to the shape of the flower lip and parviflorum, small and flower. Kansas plants belong to var. parviflorum.

Yellow lady's-slipper