Northeast Wetland Flora
Field Office Guide to Plant Species
Cypripedium candidum Muhl. ex Willd.
- Family: Orchid (Orchidaceae)
- Flowering: May-June
- Field Marks: This orchid has a single, terminal flower borne on a leafy stem. The white lip petal has a waxy appearance. The interior of the flower is distinctly yellow.
- Habitat: Bogs, swamps, fens, wet prairies.
- Habit: Perennial herb with thick, fibrous roots.
- Stems: Upright, unbranched, up to 1 1/2 feet tall, glandular-hairy, bearing several leaves.
- Leaves: Several, alternate, lanceolate to elliptic, pointed at the tip, up to 6 inches long, up to 1 3/4 inches wide.
- Flowers: Borne singly at the tip of a leafy stem, up to 2 1/2 inches long, white with a yellow interior, slightly fragrant, subtended by an upright, leaf-like bract.
- Sepals: 3, united, greenish yellow striped with purple, narrowly lanceolate, long-tapering at the tip, up to 1 3/4 inches long, up to 1/2 inch wide.
- Petals: 3, unequal, the 2 lateral ones greenish yellow striped with purple, linear-lanceolate, long-tapering at the tip, twisted, up to 2 1/2 inches long, about 1/4 inch wide; lip petal pouchshaped, white striped with purple, waxy, up to 1 1/4 inches long.
- Stamens: 2.
- Pistils: Ovary inferior.
- Fruits: Capsule ellipsoid, erect, up to 1 1/2 inches long.
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