Yellow & Purple Lady Slippers flower
Cypripedium calceolus
It is a lady's-slipper orchid, and the type species of the genus Cypripedium. It is typically found in open woodland on moist calcareous
soils. In continental Europe it is also found growing in the decomposed
humus of semi-shaded woodland cover on limestone.
It has declined over
much of the European part of its range, and as a result is legally protected in a number of countries. While the virtual extinction of the lady's-slipper orchid from its
historical range in Britain is often blamed on uprooting by gardeners
and botanists, it is also the case that its preferred habitat shrank
markedly with human clearance of woodland from the limestone landscape,
and the grazing of sheep will have finished it off.
It became a protected species in the UK in 1975 under the Conservation of Wild Creatures and Wild Plants Act, but a reintroduction programme for the lady’s-slipper orchid is in place, and has led to a population of hundreds of plants as of 2003.
Sources : Wikipedia & Google Images