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Chinese Plant Names | Family List | Orchidaceae | Cypripedium

Cypripedium elegans Rchb. f.

Description from Flora of China

Plants 10-15 cm tall, with a slender, creeping rhizome. Stem erect, densely villous, with 2 tubular sheaths at base and 2 leaves at apex. Leaves spreading horizontally, opposite or subopposite; blade ovate or broadly ovate, 4-5 × 3-3.5 cm, herbaceous, both surfaces sparsely pubescent or rarely glabrous, long ciliate, with 3(-5) prominent veins raised abaxially, apex obtuse. Inflorescence terminal, suberect, with 1 flower; peduncle 2-4 cm, villous; floral bracts ovate, 1.5-2 × 0.6-0.8 cm, slightly shortly hairy; pedicel and ovary 4-5 mm, hairy along longitudinal ridges. Flower small; sepals and petals yellowish green, adaxially with purplish red stripes; lip yellowish green to nearly white, with 3 purplish red warty stripes at front. Dorsal sepal elliptic-ovate, 1.5-2 × 0.6-1 cm, glabrous, apex acute; synsepal similar to dorsal sepal, apex shallowly 2-lobed. Petals lanceolate, 1.5-2 × 0.4-0.5 cm, glabrous, apex subacute; lip pouched, subglobose, ca. 1 cm, often upturned at apex with its mouth hidden. Staminode transversely elliptic, small, ca. 1.5 × 2 mm, base with a short stalk. Fl. May-Jul.

Humus-rich soils in forests, forest margins, thickets; 3600-3700 m. S and SE Xizang, NW Yunnan [Bhutan, N India, Nepal].


 

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