Yellow Lady's Slipper (Bruce Peninsula Orchids)

Yellow Lady's Slipper

Cypripedium parviflorum

Summary ⁸

Cypripedium parviflorum, commonly known as yellow lady's slipper, moccasin flower, or hairy yellow ladyslipper is a lady's slipper orchid found in North America.

Distinguishing Features ⁹

Stem leaves 3-5, sepals longer than flowers, flowers yellow, capsules glandular with long hairs.

Distribution ⁹

Yukon: Known from 5 sites (2 historical) AK/YT border, Dempster Highway, and Wind River
North America: From Yukon to Newfoundland, southern United States
World: Circumboreal

Habitat ⁹

Moist calcareous woodlands.

Comments ¹⁰

Cypripedium parviflorum is extremely variable, reflecting individual phenotypic plasticity, infraspecific differentiation, and hybridization with related species. In particular, var. pubescens is difficult to delimit. In exposed situations, especially in calcareous soils, plants are low-growing with ascending, often narrow leaves and rather small flowers; in exposed boreal and arctic sites, plants and flowers may be very small with scarcely spiraled to flat petals. Such plants from Newfoundland were originally described as C. parviflorum var. planipetalum. When transplanted to less severe conditions, those plants often develop into larger plants with larger flowers of more common form; indeed, the holotype sheet of var. planipetalum includes a range in habit and floral morphology and includes a plant rather typical of boreal var. pubescens. The lips of smaller flowers often are markedly compressed laterally, with parallel sides, but when larger flowers are produced by the same plant, the proportions of the lip often change, the lip then being very broad below and tapering toward the adaxial surface (trapezoidal in cross section) or sometimes dorsiventrally compressed and broader than high.

The southeastern var. parviflorum differs from var. pubescens primarily in flower size and color, and the two might be merely forms. Most works dealing with Cypripedium parviflorum have treated the primarily boreal var. makasin as var. parviflorum, either including all small-lipped plants within var. parviflorum, or in some cases restricting the name to the northern variety and excluding the southeastern plants described by Salisbury as C. parviflorum. Fernald’s original publication on C. calceolus var. parviflorum actually treated var. makasin, citing a description of that variety and clearly discussing the northern plant. Additionally, although geographically accommodating Salisbury’s plant, Fernald excluded most of the range of the southeastern var. parviflorum, thereby referring most plants of var. parviflorum to var. pubescens, and further restricted var. pubescens to the east, thereby assigning most plants of that variety to his northern var. parviflorum, i.e., var. makasin. Consequently, most published illustrations of var. parviflorum are in fact var. makasin. Variety parviflorum has been dealt with primarily in publications on the southeastern flora. In the east, var. makasin is quite distinct, but in the west it becomes difficult to separate from very small plants of var. pubescens that are common there; in that area, fragrance is often the least equivocal character. In the northwest it seems to merge with C. × columbianum, and in fact the northwestern elements of the species are only artificially accommodated within the variety. Very rarely plants apparently referable to var. makasin or var. parviflorum bear white lips. In some cases that may reflect past gene flow, but in others the plants appear to be color forms.

Hybrids of Cypripedium parviflorum with C. candidum are C. × andrewsii A. M. Fuller, and different varietal parentages are recognized as nothovar. andrewsii [C. candidum × C. parviflorum var. makasin], nothovar. favillianum (J. T. Curtis) B. Boivin [C. candidum × C. parviflorum var. pubescens], and nothovar. landonii (Garay) B. Boivin [C. parviflorum var. parviflorum × C. × andrewsii nothovar. favillianum]. Hybrids of C. parviflorum with C. montanum are C. × columbianum Sheviak; the type was evidently derived from a cross with var. pubescens. Hybrids of var. pubescens commonly exhibit small lips and thus obscure varietal limits: in the northwest, C. × columbianum merges with var. makasin and var. pubescens; in the midwest, C. × andrewsii nothovar. favillianum may simulate var. parviflorum, and the delimitation of those two entities is unclear. Additionally, many plants of putative C. × andrewsii nothovar. favillianum suggest C. × columbianum. In general, those hybrids exhibit vegetative and floral morphology and color intermediate between those of their parents, or combinations of their parental characteristics. In particular, lips are commonly creamy, ivory, or yellow; often lips are yellow when the flower first opens and fade to white over the period of bloom. Consequently, different flowers on the same plant frequently exhibit a range of lip colors. Lip color furthermore sometimes varies from year to year in individual plants. Additionally, C. montanum and C. parviflorum var. makasin commonly contribute the dark coloration of their sepals and petals to hybrids with C. parviflorum and C. candidum, respectively. The apical margin of the orifice in C. candidum and C. montanum is typically acute, forming a sharp angle directed toward the apex of the lip. In C. parviflorum, this is a variable feature, but typically the margin is obtuse. Variation in this feature in yellow-lipped plants may in some circumstances aid the recognition of hybrids.

Conservation actions ¹¹

Conservation Actions

All orchid species are included under Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

Cypripedium parviflorum is listed by the U.S. Federal Government in Arizona, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Washington.

The following actions are recommended to protect Cypripedium parviflorum:

- Protection of the habitat, especially woodland from timber harvesting, infrastructure development and grazing.

- Fencing vulnerable sites to protect the species from collection.

- Prescribed fires can benefit Cypripedium parviflorum to some threshold but can pose negative impacts as the point at which this threshold is reached or exceeded is unknown.

-Management of habitat to reduce competition for resources (i.e., water, nutrients, light) may improve both the habitat and health of Cypripedium parviflorum occurrences.

- Further research on the life cycle and ecology of C. parviflorum will increase our knowledge about this species and help managers to develop effective approaches to its conservation.

- Management of protected areas and plant salvage could be considered as beneficial to Cypripedium parviflorum.

- Land protection and habitat diffuse management can be implemented to conserve habitat near or between occurrences.

- Increasing natural recruitment at a site by population reinforcement is a management method to enhance small natural populations.

- Successional management which involves the direct manipulation of seral stages within the existing community to produce the optimal habitat

- Control and management of sedative production from the roots.

- Raise public awareness.

- Protection of the living individuals of the species through legislation and legal protection which ban the species not to be picked or dug up.

- Ex situ conservation: Artificial propagation, re-introduction, seed collections.

- Monitoring and surveillance of the existing populations and sites.

- Estimate population size and study population dynamics.

Description ¹²

Plants erect, 70–700 cm. Flowers: sepals greenish or yellowish (often obscured by darker markings); dorsal sepal suborbiculate or ovate to ovate-lance-acuminate, 19–80 × 7–40 mm; lateral sepals connate; synsepal 11–80 × 5–34 mm; petals horizontal to strongly descending, same color as sepals, commonly spirally twisted or undulate, sometimes flat, linear-lanceolate to lance-ovate or oblong, 24–97 × 3–12 mm; lip rather pale to deep yellow, very rarely white, rarely with reddish spots or suffusion on adaxial external surface, 15–54 mm; orifice basal; staminode cordiform-ovoid, deltoid, lance-ovoid, or ovoid-oblong.

Diagnostic description ¹³

Petals conspicuously twisted, pouch small, 2-2.5 cm, sepals and petals deep reddish brown.

Habitat ¹⁴

Comments: Rich, humus and decaying leaf litter in wooded areas, often on rocky wooded hillsides on north or east facing slopes, also wooded loess river bluffs. Moist creeksides or swales in spruce zones, soils sandy loams to loams.

Habitat and ecology ¹⁵

Habitat and Ecology

Cypripedium parviflorum occurs in a variety of habitats from mountain meadows, mesic places in Ponderosa Pine, mixed conifer, aspen forest communities, non-sphagnum bogs, marshes, wet prairies, rocky wooded hillsides and mixed woodlands commonly associated with oak, ash, and hazelnut woodlands. The species grows onmoderately moist to dry substrates, confined to predominantly calcareous stony soils, rich in humus, with basic, neutral, to acidic pH soil. The species prefers shaded, cool, north-facing and well-drained slopes. Flowering takes place from late May to late June.

Sources: Ardittiet al. 1979; Coleman 2002; Cribb 1997; Dorn 2001; Frosch and Cribb 2012; Kartesz 1994; Lesica 1986; Luer 1975; Meadset al. 2000; Mergen 2006, Sheviak 1974, 2002; Weber and Wittmann 2012; Welsh 1974.

Systems

Terrestrial
Freshwater

Threats ¹⁶

Major Threats

Cypripedium parviflorum is under numerous anthropogenic threats especiallyplant collecting for research, personal garden use, illegal sale for horticultural or medicinal use, and botanical collections or voucher specimens; timber harvest; infrastructure development and road construction; grazing by livestock or wildlife, habitat loss due to some management activities such as recreation activities by direct effect (e.g., destruction of plants) and indirect effect (e.g., alteration of habitat); weed control as the amount of light and competition from other plants appear to have a negative influence in the number of species; fire suppression and mining which generally involves large-scale land disturbance to soil surface conditions and nearby plant communities.In addition, to the human interferences, environmental risks to this species include drought, flooding, climate change and wildfires are also considered major threats.

Sources and Credits

(c) Aaron Hoff, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), https://www.flickr.com/photos/voidloo/26777164654/
(c) Rodrigo Sala, some rights reserved (CC BY-ND), http://www.flickr.com/photos/85808012@N00/2608381277
(c) Steve Garvie, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), https://www.flickr.com/photos/rainbirder/14332403135/
(c) Captain Tenneal, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-ND), https://www.flickr.com/photos/tshearer/3689363564/
(c) NC Orchid, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), https://www.flickr.com/photos/ncorchid/4722771902/
(c) Tom Potterfield, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://www.flickr.com/photos/tgpotterfield/6484568001/
(c) NC Orchid, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), https://www.flickr.com/photos/ncorchid/3658062819/
Adapted by bpff from a work by (c) Wikipedia, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cypripedium_parviflorum
(c) L.G. Johanson, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), https://www.inaturalist.org/guide_taxa/519918
(c) Missouri Botanical Garden, 4344 Shaw Boulevard, St. Louis, MO, 63110 USA, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/19829540
(c) International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/34414659
(c) Missouri Botanical Garden, 4344 Shaw Boulevard, St. Louis, MO, 63110 USA, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/5018052
(c) NatureServe, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), http://eol.org/data_objects/28970433
(c) NatureServe, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), http://eol.org/data_objects/28970436
(c) International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/34414657
(c) International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/34414658

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