ORCHID FAMILY 

 (Orfkidaefte) 



Perennial herbs with flowers of remarkable, sometimes gro- 

 tesque shapes, of six segments; the three outer (sepals) similar 

 to one another and petal-like, two of the inner (lateral petals) 

 alike, but the third (the lip) is usually markedly different, 

 generally very prominent and often spurred. Stamens, 1 or 2, 

 united with the style into an organ called the column* Leaves 

 alternate, parallel- veined. 



LADY'S SLIPPER (Cypripedium montanum, DougL). Flow- 

 ers 1 to 3 on a leafy stalk a foot or two high, the lip in the 

 shape of an inflated sac, an inch or so Long, white with purple 

 veins, the stringy sepals and wavy-twisted lateral petals 

 purplish brown. Blooms in early summer, in moist Sierra 

 woodlands from Central California (the Yosemite region) 

 northward, and in the Coast Ranges in late spring. A plant 

 that is all the lovelier because of its comparative rarity. 



One other species may be met with in Northern California 

 swamps and moist grounds C. catifornicum, Gray, disting- 

 uished by a taller stem, more numerous blossoms and greenish- 

 ye: ,-.. sepal* hardly half M mA lofljf, 

 M 



