Cypripedium chinense Franchet.

Plants 30-60 cm tall, with a rather stout rhizome. Stem erect, pubescent, with several sheaths at base and 4 or 5 leaves above. Leaf blade elliptic to ovate-lanceolate, 10-18 × 6-8 cm, glabrous or pubescent near abaxial base, apex acuminate. Inflorescence terminal, usually 2- or 3-flowered; floral bracts foliaceous, ovate-lanceolate or lanceolate, 4-10 × 1-3 cm, glabrous or occasionally pubescent on abaxial veins, apex cuspidate-acuminate; pedicel and ovary 2.5-4 cm, densely white glandular hairy. Flowers green to greenish. Dorsal sepal ovate-lanceolate, 3.5-4.5 × 1-1.5 cm, slightly pubescent on abaxial veins especially toward base, apex acuminate; synsepal similar to dorsal sepal, apex shallowly 2-lobed. Petals usually slightly twisted, linear-lanceolate, 4-5 × 0.5-0.7 cm, pubescent toward adaxial base and on abaxial veins, apex acuminate; lip deeply pouched, ellipsoid, ca. 2 cm, ca. 1.5 cm in diam., outside glabrous, inner bottom hairy. Staminode elliptic or ovate-elliptic, 6-7 × 3-4 mm, abaxially carinate, base with a stalk 2-3 mm. Capsule subellipsoid or narrowly ellipsoid, to 3.5 × 1.2 cm, hairy. Fl. Apr-May, fr. Jul-Sep. 2n = 22*.

● Humus-rich places in open forests, at forest margins, or on scrubby slopes; 800-2800 m. S Gansu, Guizhou, W Hubei, S Shaanxi, S Shanxi, Sichuan, NW to SE Yunnan.