For May, 1923 



123 



Hardy Cypripedium 



RICHARD ROTHE 



CONSIDERED the showiest of the orchids inhabiting 

 the temperate zones, the species of hardy cypri- 

 pediums indigenous to our country rank among the 

 most beautiful we know of, but so far we rarely meet 

 them in our gardens. The reason for our frequent fail- 

 ures in attempts to establish and cultivate plantations of 

 our Lady's Slippers or Moccasin flowers, is that we do 

 not, or sometimes cannot, provide the same conditions for 

 their thriving as Nature does. They prefer semi-shady 

 positions and like moisture, but neither stagnant nor ex- 

 cessive moisture. We shall always find them on well- 

 drained ground, their long roots reaching out far, in 

 depth seldom lower than four inches below the surface of 

 a comparatively shallow layer of light leafy or peaty soil, 

 of more or less sandy nature. They inhabit mostly the 

 v\'ooded regions, both in mountainous and lowland sec- 

 tions, and there we mav find them from the Middle 



Cypripcdiii'iii acaiiU- 



Atlantic States, as far north as Canada. Successful 

 domesticating of our wild growing cypripediums, how- 

 ever, is far easier in New England and northern boundary 

 States than in gardens south of New York. 



On account of frequency and wide distribution, cypri- 

 pedium acaule is perhaps our best known native species. 

 It bears its flowers on straight stems, one foot above its 

 two ground leaves, and we may see it in bloom from May 

 until the end of June, according to latitude. Our photo- 

 graph was taken during the latter part of June in the small 

 sample rockery I built for the nursery at Northeast Har- 

 bor, Maine, about fifteen years ago. Within the excep- 

 tionally favorable northern sea-coast climate the color of 

 the flowers varied from white to a deep rosy purple. 

 Cypripedium parviflorum and pubescens resemble each 

 other very closely, the only means of distinction being the 

 size of their yellow flowers. Those of pubescens are 

 noticably larger than the ones produced by parviflorum. 



Cypripedium spectabile, recently re-named, and dis- 

 cribed as Cypripedium reginse, is the stateliest and most 

 beautiful representative of all known hardv ^Moccasin 

 flowers. Its leafy stalks, nearly two feet high, bear the 

 large rosy purple shaded flowers well above the foliage. 

 This species is wonderfully effective in bog gardens when 

 massed together in clumps of from a dozen to twenty-five 

 plants. 



Of the foreign hardv Lady's Slippers, meriting the 

 attention of American g;arden lovers, I quote, according 



to descriptive list given in the new edition of Tarouca 

 and C. Schneider's Standard Work on "Hardy Peren- 

 nials." 



Cypripedium calceolus, native of Central Europe ; color 

 reddish brown and yellow. Cypripedium cordigerum, 

 hailing from China, Alanchuria and the Himalaya ; 

 flowers greenish white. C. macranthum, a native of 

 Siberia, color of large blossoms deep reddish and pink 

 purple. C. tibeticum, northern China, flowers light 

 brown. C. guttatum, Russia, northern Asia, rhizomatous, 

 small flowering, white with carmine. C. ventricosum, 

 Manchuria and Siberia, color varying from white to 

 bright reddish purple. 



Recent new introduction from western China: C. 

 luteimi in habit of growth resembling spectabile but pro- 

 ducing light sulphur yellow flowers and C. margari- 

 taceum in habit of growth similar to acaule. 



SOME HARDY GERANIUMS 



(Confiiiiicd froiii /'J^^t; 119) 

 above is of the saine style, but with a more beautiful 

 foliage and even more magnificent flowers, which share with 

 those of ibericum one failing — a short period of blossom- 

 ing. Still taller, ascending in some kinds to three or four 

 feet, is the old G. pratense of our cottage gardens which, 

 in one or two varieties, can still hold its own against the 

 inrush of novelties. Personally, I like the single white and 

 the single blue, especially for the semi-wild garden, and 

 then there is an old variety, now rather rare, which has 

 large double flowers in a very delicate silvery smoke-blue, 

 a plant of surpassing beauty for a cool, half-shady spot. 



G. atlanticum also claims notice here. A native, not of 

 the Atlantic Ocean, but of the Atlas Mountains, this 

 species is distinct in more than one particular. It pro- 

 duces a luscious crop of six-inch leafage, like that of some 

 Wood Anemone, above which in May or June stand the 

 erect stems of violet flowers. Then towards the Summer's 

 end the stemless foliage dies away only to re-appear re- 

 freshed with the rains of October. Another species of 

 special merit for the rock-garden is G. Traversii, which 

 proves hardy though a New Zealander, and one which is 

 at once recognized by its somewhat large, bluntly-lobed 

 leaves, which shimmer with a silvery sheen. There is a 

 white form of G. Traversii, also some with flowers of a 

 washv blush, none of which can compare with the variety 

 sometimes listed as var. elegans in which the blooms, 

 which open flat, are nearly two inches across and of a 

 most refined and exquisite shell-pink. 



From the last-mentioned one might easily be persuaded 

 to enter those entrancing pastures in which dwell the 

 many silvery-leaved little treasures of the rock-garden. 

 l!ut, even if space did not forbid, the pitfalls of classifi- 

 cation might bring one to confusion amid the shoals of 

 Erodium. So I must content myself with a mention of 

 the new G. "Russel Prichard." which suggests a blend 

 of sanguineum and traversii in its blood-red flowers and 

 silvery foliage, and wind up with a regret that the many 

 good American species of this genus are still so uncom- 

 mon in English gardens. G. Fremonti and csespitosum, 

 Richardsonii and sessiliflorum we have, but even these 

 are an\'thing but well known. 



The heart that is soonest awake to the flowers is always 

 the first to be touch'd bv the thorns. — Moore. 



