A yellow pouch, shaped like a shoe, hangs between long twisted maroon petals on Britain's rarest and showiest native orchid
Lady's slipper orchid — Cypripedium calceolus.
Nature · Wildflowers & flowers
Lady's slipper orchid
Native · flowers late May–early Jun · limestone woods and pastures; extremely rare
Cypripedium calceolus — Orchidaceae
The lady's slipper is Britain's rarest and most spectacular native orchid: a large yellow pouch set between long twisted maroon petals. Victorian collectors dug it almost out of existence, and by the twentieth century one plant survived in the Yorkshire Dales, its site kept secret and guarded by volunteers. Seedlings raised at Kew have since been planted out at reintroduction sites, where they now flower, and, announced in 2025, the first naturally regenerated seedling in nearly a hundred years was found.
How to spot them
- ▸A big yellow, slipper-shaped pouch for a lip, with long, narrow, twisted maroon-brown sepals and petals
- ▸One or two flowers on a stem, above broad, pleated, oval leaves that look more like a lily than an orchid
- ▸Flowers in late May and early June on shaded limestone slopes and woodland edges
- ▸No look-alike among British orchids: the only one with an inflated slipper lip
- ▸Almost always seen on a protected reintroduction site, not by chance in the wild
How to know it
A Victorian craze for collecting orchids drove it to the brink, and by the early twentieth century a single plant survived in the Yorkshire Dales
Lady's slipper orchid — a lone plant found in 1930 and kept secret.
Micropropagated from seed at Kew, its seedlings were planted out on Yorkshire Wildlife Trust and partner sites, flowering from 2004
Lady's slipper orchid — the reintroduction programme.
Announced in 2025, the first naturally regenerated seedling in nearly a hundred years was found at a reintroduction site in Yorkshire
Lady's slipper orchid — the first self-sown plant from reintroduced stock.
A bee that lands in the smooth-walled pouch cannot climb out the way it came, and must squeeze out past the anthers, collecting pollen as it leaves
Lady's slipper orchid — a pitfall trap pollinated by solitary bees.
Its Latin species name means 'little shoe', and its genus name links the pouch to Venus
Cypripedium calceolus — the lady's slipper orchid.
Protected on Schedule 8 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, it is a criminal offence to pick or dig up this plant
Lady's slipper orchid — one of the wild orchids on Schedule 8.
Quick-fire facts
- •Family Orchidaceae; calceolus is Latin for 'little shoe'; Cypripedium comes from Kypris (Venus) and pedilon (sandal or slipper), the 'Venus's slipper'
- •Native; formerly ranged from Cumbria to Derbyshire (Yorkshire Wildlife Trust), and reduced by Victorian collecting and habitat loss to near extinction in the early twentieth century
- •A single wild plant was found in the Yorkshire Dales in 1930; its location was kept secret for decades and volunteers guarded it round the clock against theft
- •Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew propagated seedlings in the laboratory from seed, giving far more successful seedlings than natural germination; volunteers nurtured young plants over several years before they were planted out
- •Reintroduced plants first flowered at reintroduction sites in 2004
- •Announced in 2025 (found the previous summer, per the BSBI press release): the first new naturally regenerated lady's slipper in the wild for nearly a hundred years was found at a reintroduction site, proof that planted-out orchids had set seed that germinated (Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, BSBI). The project is led by Yorkshire Wildlife Trust with Natural England, Kew, the National Trust, Plantlife and BSBI
- •You can see flowering plants at Kilnsey Park near Grassington in the Yorkshire Dales in late May and early June
- •Listed on Schedule 8 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981: it is an offence intentionally to pick, uproot or destroy it. Never dig up or pick any wild orchid
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Sources
- Yorkshire Wildlife Trust — Groundbreaking project successfully returns orchid on the brink of extinction to Yorkshire
- Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland — Lady's-slipper Orchid returns to Yorkshire
- legislation.gov.uk — Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, Schedule 8