Sign in Start free
Species library › Cypripedium › Cypripedium guttatum
Orchids Well documented

Cypripedium guttatum

The spotted lady's slipper, a small (12 to 35 cm) boreal orchid with white-and-magenta pouches, found across the taiga from Belarus through Siberia to Alaska and Yukon. It needs a short, cool summer growing season and a long, deep winter dormancy below freezing. It is notoriously hard to keep in cultivation.

Cypripedium guttatum
Photo: sunoochi from Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
At home, aim for
Day Cool-growingTargets in Plantistry
Night Close to the dayTargets in Plantistry
Humidity Ordinary room humidityBand in Plantistry
Light Bright, filtered lightDLI and PPFD in Plantistry
Expects a seasonal restGrows in the ground

Where it grows wild

Open birch, larch and pine forest, forest edges, thickets and grassy meadows, often on moist, humus-rich, neutral to calcareous soils.

Ten records give 120 to 3,810 m (median 800 m); the high records are from the Himalaya and Tibet, and most of Siberia is lowland.

RussiaSiberiaMongoliaChinaKoreaJapanAlaskaYukonNorthwest TerritoriesBelarusUkraine

🔒 Growing it like that

The wild conditions above, turned into targets for a shelf, a tent or a greenhouse. The full profile has:

✓ Day and night temperature targets, and the limits it tolerates
✓ Humidity band, and how to hold it
✓ Light as DLI and PPFD for a grow light
✓ Wet and dry seasons, and whether to rest it
✓ Substrate and airflow
✓ A step-by-step setup to grow it like the wild

Grow Cypripedium guttatum? Add it to a free garden and its full profile opens. Pro opens all 38,374 profiles in the library, plants and fungi.

Start free Sign in

More Cypripedium

Cypripedium candidum Cypripedium arietinum Cypripedium acaule Cypripedium parviflorum Cypripedium reginae Cypripedium calceolus Cypripedium formosanum Cypripedium macranthos Cypripedium passerinum Cypripedium tibeticum Cypripedium kentuckiense Cypripedium fasciculatum All 62 →

Profiles are drafts built from measured range and climate and from published sources; each section carries its own confidence in the app. Photo from Wikimedia Commons, used under its CC BY 2.0 licence, unmodified.