Little jewels in the garden

Michele Cleland's son Ryan alerted her to an unusual flower growing in the woods behind their house five years ago.

When Cleland walked back to look, she discovered a wonderful surprise - pink lady- slippers growing all around.

"I said, 'Wow! What is that?' " Cleland said, still re calling the experience vividly.

She found herself tiptoeing though a bed of exotic pink orchids. And this year, the lady-slippers are blooming once again as they have every year since then.

Everywhere you step and you have to tread lightly, you might see yet another lady- slipper. On the other hand if you move several yards in any direction away from the large clump of flowers, about the size of a smallish backyard, no lady-slippers are seen at all.

"It's just this one spot that I know of," Cleland said

Cleland's discovery grows in a city-owned wooded area between two suburban developments off Princess Anne Road in Virginia Beach. Nothing is particularly special about the woods. The trees are on the small side, as if the land had perhaps been used for agriculture at some point.

"It's no pristine area," Cleland said.

Yet pristinely pure lady-slippers grow there in full glory. Their pink slipper pouches nod from leafless stems. Smaller flower petals top the slipper like a floppy sun hat. Two leaves grow straight from the ground cupping the stem as if they were protective hands.

Cleland let the city know what little jewels they had growing on the property. She was hoping to have the flowers protected, but all the city could do, she said, was post the land with signs saying "No cutting of trees or other vegetation permitted."

Lady-slippers are not considered an endangered species in Virginia. Though they are rare in many places, the plants are prolific in spots where they do grow, as they are behind Cleland's house. A hundred or more could be growing in that one spot.

Pink lady-slippers are found in dappled shade throughout the eastern United States and in parts of the upper Midwest. They grow on dry mountain slopes and in moist woods. It seems the location is not as important as are certain fungi that grow in the soil. Lady-slippers cannot grow unless their roots are associated with these fungi.

That's why the flowers are truly rare in gardens. No wildflower should be transplanted from the wild. In the case of lady-slippers, however, it is virtually impossible to transplant them, because fungi in the surrounding soil are essential to their survival. Even under ideal conditions, it can take up to five years for a lady- slipper seed to mature into a blooming plant. Not to mention the fact that handling the plants often causes a rash.

Only a very few nurseries propagate them. You may find them in catalogs, for rar efied prices, perhaps up to $100 each.

The scientific name for the pink lady-slipper, sometimes called a pink moccasin flower, is "Cypripedium acaule." Cypripedium is from the Greek for Venus's slipper and acaule refers to the leafless flower stalk.

One of our biggest and showiest wild orchids, lady-slippers never cease to surprise people who come across them in the woods.

Mary Reid Barrow, barrow1@cox.net