Flora of North America species comparison

Varieties 3 (3 in the flora).

Cypripedium parviflorum is extremely variable, reflecting individual phenotypic plasticity, infraspecific differentiation, and hybridization with related species. In particular, var. pubescens is difficult to delimit. In exposed situations, especially in calcareous soils, plants are low-growing with ascending, often narrow leaves and rather small flowers; in exposed boreal and arctic sites, plants and flowers may be very small with scarcely spiraled to flat petals. Such plants from Newfoundland were originally described as C. parviflorum var. planipetalum. When transplanted to less severe conditions, those plants often develop into larger plants with larger flowers of more common form; indeed, the holotype sheet of var. planipetalum includes a range in habit and floral morphology and includes a plant rather typical of boreal var. pubescens. The lips of smaller flowers often are markedly compressed laterally, with parallel sides, but when larger flowers are produced by the same plant, the proportions of the lip often change, the lip then being very broad below and tapering toward the adaxial surface (trapezoidal in cross section) or sometimes dorsiventrally compressed and broader than high.

The southeastern var. parviflorum differs from var. pubescens primarily in flower size and color, and the two might be merely forms. Most works dealing with Cypripedium parviflorum have treated the primarily boreal var. makasin as var. parviflorum, either including all small-lipped plants within var. parviflorum, or in some cases restricting the name to the northern variety and excluding the southeastern plants described by Salisbury as C. parviflorum. Fernald’s original publication on C. calceolus var. parviflorum actually treated var. makasin, citing a description of that variety and clearly discussing the northern plant. Additionally, although geographically accommodating Salisbury’s plant, Fernald excluded most of the range of the southeastern var. parviflorum, thereby referring most plants of var. parviflorum to var. pubescens, and further restricted var. pubescens to the east, thereby assigning most plants of that variety to his northern var. parviflorum, i.e., var. makasin. Consequently, most published illustrations of var. parviflorum are in fact var. makasin. Variety parviflorum has been dealt with primarily in publications on the southeastern flora. In the east, var. makasin is quite distinct, but in the west it becomes difficult to separate from very small plants of var. pubescens that are common there; in that area, fragrance is often the least equivocal character. In the northwest it seems to merge with C. ×columbianum, and in fact the northwestern elements of the species are only artificially accommodated within the variety. Very rarely plants apparently referable to var. makasin or var. parviflorum bear white lips. In some cases that may reflect past gene flow, but in others the plants appear to be color forms.

Hybrids of Cypripedium parviflorum with C. candidum are C. ×andrewsii A. M. Fuller, and different varietal parentages are recognized as nothovar. andrewsii [C. candidum × C. parviflorum var. makasin], nothovar. favillianum (J. T. Curtis) B. Boivin [C. candidum × C. parviflorum var. pubescens], and nothovar. landonii (Garay) B. Boivin [C. parviflorum var. parviflorum × C. ×andrewsii nothovar. favillianum]. Hybrids of C. parviflorum with C. montanum are C. ×columbianum Sheviak; the type was evidently derived from a cross with var. pubescens. Hybrids of var. pubescens commonly exhibit small lips and thus obscure varietal limits: in the northwest, C. ×columbianum merges with var. makasin and var. pubescens; in the midwest, C. ×andrewsii nothovar. favillianum may simulate var. parviflorum, and the delimitation of those two entities is unclear. Additionally, many plants of putative C. ×andrewsii nothovar. favillianum suggest C. ×columbianum. In general, those hybrids exhibit vegetative and floral morphology and color intermediate between those of their parents, or combinations of their parental characteristics. In particular, lips are commonly creamy, ivory, or yellow; often lips are yellow when the flower first opens and fade to white over the period of bloom. Consequently, different flowers on the same plant frequently exhibit a range of lip colors. Lip color furthermore sometimes varies from year to year in individual plants. Additionally, C. montanum and C. parviflorum var. makasin commonly contribute the dark coloration of their sepals and petals to hybrids with C. parviflorum and C. candidum, respectively. The apical margin of the orifice in C. candidum and C. montanum is typically acute, forming a sharp angle directed toward the apex of the lip. In C. parviflorum, this is a variable feature, but typically the margin is obtuse. Variation in this feature in yellow-lipped plants may in some circumstances aid the recognition of hybrids.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)