pink lady’s slipper

not listed

N5 - Secure

SNR - Unranked

not listed

FACW - Facultative wetland

FACW - Facultative wetland

FACW - Facultative wetland

Pink lady’s slipper is a 5½″ to 19¾″ tall, erect, perennial forb. It rises on a pair of basal leaves and a single leafless flower stalk (scape) from a long rhizome and widely-spaced roots. The rhizome is horizontal, slender, fleshy, and sometimes branched. The roots are white, fleshy or cord-like, and up to 13¾″ long.

In the first two or three years after germination the plant lives entirely underground as a shapeless mass of cells (protocorm). In the third or fourth spring a single pair of ascending to spreading leaves rise directly from the rhizome. Each blade is elliptic, 3½″ to 9″ long, 1″ to 4″ wide. It sheaths the flowering stem at the base, is broadly angled at the tip, and is plaited or folded, like a fan. The upper surface is green. The lower surface is silvery and shiny. Both surfaces are covered with short glandular hairs. The margins are untoothed.

The inflorescence is a solitary flower at the end of an erect stalk (scape). The scape is hairy, leafless, and round in cross section. A single leaf-like appendage (bract) subtends the flower. The bract is stalkless, lance-shaped, green, hairy, ⅞″ to 1¾″ long, and ⅜″ to ½″ wide.

The flower has three sepals and three petals. The sepals are covered with glandular hairs. The upper sepal is elliptic to lance-shaped elliptic, yellowish-green to brown or purple, 1″ to 1½″ long, and 3 ⁄16″ to ⅞″ wide. It is arched over the inflated lower lip petal. The bract subtending the flower arches over the upper sepal like a hood. The two lateral sepals are fused together into a single structure (synsepal) that is located directly below the lip petal. The synsepal is egg-shaped to lance-shaped, ⅝″ to 2″ long, ¼″ to 1″ wide, and is similar in appearance to the upper sepal.

The two lateral petals are linear lance-shaped to lance-linear, 1⅛″ to 1¾″ long, ⅛″ to ⅝″ wide, and similar in appearance to the sepals. They are bent abruptly downward to somewhat spreading and are slightly spirally twisted. The lower petal (lip) is inflated to form a large, showy, slipper-like, 15 ⁄16″ to 2⅜″ long, 13 ⁄16″ to 19 ⁄16″ wide pouch. It is pink to magenta or purple, with dark branching veins. It is covered with glandular hairs. The upper (dorsal) surface has a deep longitudinal fissure the length of the lip.

Unlike other orchids, the filaments and style are not fused into a column. There are 2 stamens and an enlarged, modified, sterile stamen (staminode). The staminode is purplish-green and inversely egg-shaped to almost four-angled. It curves over the base of the lip petal and below the upper sepal. There is one style with a lobed stigma.

The fruit is a single, erect, ellipse-shaped, ribbed, ¾″ to 19 ⁄16″ long capsule. The persistent bract partially encloses the base of the capsule.

5½″ to 19¾″

Pink with red veins

Dry to wet. Woods, swamps. Acidic soil.

May 24 to July 10

Sources

2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 24, 25, 28, 29, 30.

Native

Uncommon

I came across the link lady slipper for the first time in my life!

Location: Wisconsin

I came across the link lady slipper for the first time in my life!

Location: St. Louis Co.