Paphiopedilum

Paphiopedilum is a gender with around 80 species spread throughout tropical and subtropical China, India, Southeast-Asia and Oceania. They are mainly terrestrial plants, with a few exceptions of some species that are epiphytes and lithophytes.

These plants are often spotted and can be short and round or lanceolate. De flowers appear on a bunch, with one or some flowers. The flower has an enlarged sepal, that is usually marked remarkably. The other sepals are generally small and hide behind the lip. The petals can be short and round, or long stretched and twisted. 

Like with other species out of the subfamily Cypripedioideae you see a remarkable lip. This lip looks like a pouch and is used to catch insects for pollination. At the moment an insect has crawled into the pouch, it can only go outside through a small gap. While it’s crawling outside, its body gets in contact with the pollinia. At a next flower, the insect will fertilize the pistil.

They look like the Cypripediums out of North-America. Also, this gender is known as slipper ladies or the Venus slipper. ‘Paphia’ is a different name for Aphrodite. Aphrodite refers to the beauty of the flower. Furthermore, species of the Paphiopedilum are often used as living room plant..