PE rs flora“ emblem 
     
    
   
   
    
     BY BRUCE MaCLAREN 
     
    
   
   
    
     The Pink Lady's Slipper is one of about twenty two wild orchids known 
     
     in the province. There is so much that could be written about this lovely 
     
     plant that it is difficult to find a beginning. Perhaps a good-start would 
     
     be to explain how the Pink Lady's Slipper (Cypripedium acaule) came to be 
     
     the floral emblem of our province. 
     
    

    
     In 1947 a floral emblem act was passed by the legislature naming the 
     
     Showy Lady's Slipper (Cypripedium reginae) as the floral emblem. A few 
     
     years later not enough of this species could be found in the province to~ 
     
     make a display for the Fathers of Confederation building in Charlottetown! ' 
     
     In 1965 an amendment to the act named the Pink Lady's Slipper as the floral 
     
     emblem of the province. 
     
    

    
     Over a wide range of territory in the northern half of North America 
     
     the Pink Lady's Slipper is found and is known by a multitude of names. It 
     
     is difficult to understand how some of these originated. For example: Noah's 
     
     Ark, hare's lip, old goose and camel's foot. In Quebec 
     
     the flower is called sabot g3 la Vierge, shoe of the 
     
     Virgin. 
     
    

    
     The bloom of the Pink Lady's Slipper is difficult 
     
     to describe and I shall not attempt to do so. The 
     
     really important part of the bloom is the third petal, 
     
     a pouch (choe) formed by the inflated lip, covered 
     
     with soft pubescence. The color may vary from white to 
     
     nearly crimson. The pouch is split down the middle 
     
     with the lips tightly pressed together, folded inwards 
     
     with the inner surface covered with long, stiff, white 
     
     hairs. 
     
    

    
     Fertilization of the bloom is a very intricate 
     
     process and is accomplished with the help of quite 
     
     small insects. the inside floor of the pouch is lined 
     
     downy hairs that produce a sweet nectar to attract in- 
     
     sects. The small insects force a passage through the 
     
     lower part of the bloom, load up with nectar, and then find they can't get 
     
     out the way they came in. Looking for a way to escape they see light at the 
     
     base of the bloom. In their progress towards this exit they must pollinate 
     
     the flower in which they were trapped and, moving on to the next flower, 
     
     bring pollen from the first one entered. This is an over-simplification of 
     
     the pollinating process but does describe it roughly. Maybe some readers 
     
     have noticed that most Lady's Slippers do not produce seed capsules. Nobody 
     
     fully understands why but perhaps the best opinion is a shortage of insects 
     
     of the right kind. 
     
    

    
     I believe that today we have many more Pink Lady's Slippers than we 
     
     had fifty years ago. Why do I believe this? Let me tell you of the first 
     
     Lady's Slipper I ever saw. My oldest brother, a veteran of World War I, was 
     
     a bit at loose ends for a time after he came home. All of us were brought 
     
     up to love nature and my brother was probably the best naturalist of all of 
     
     us. One day he came home greatly excited because he had found a Lady's 
     
     Slipper. Naturally he did not pick it, but took us all to see the plant, 
     
     which was growing in moist soil near a stream that originated a short dis- 
     
     tance away. There was no way that Lady's Slipper could have escaped our 
     
     notice previously because all our lives, any spare time was spent in the 
     
     fields and woods. Today, within a radius of one kilometer, there are not 
     
     dozens but hundreds of Pink Lady's Slippers. In addition the Lady's Slipper 
     
     was always a favourite of mine and I could not begin to number all of the 
     
    
   
   
    
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