pink lady's slipper

Stages of Growth of Pink Lady’s Slipper Orchids /  by Todd Henson

It takes time and effort, but it can be a fun and educational exercise to trace the lifecycle of a plant. Today we look at some of the stages of growth of pink lady’s slippers, a type of orchid native to parts of North America and found, in this case, in Virginia.

Note that I didn’t capture all the stages from a single plant. And there are stages I’m unable to witness, such as those that occur below the soil before new growth appears in spring. There may also be later stages I’ve yet to capture. If so I’ll update this page with any more I record.

First Hint of Green

The first hint of green of a pink lady’s slipper just emerging from the soil and a layer of pine needles.

On April 2nd, I found the first signs of growth, this little tip of green just poking through the pine needles next to a fallen tree.

Leaves Form

The young leaves of two pink lady’s slippers. Each has two leaves.

Before long that little tip of green will open into a pair of leaves. Some young plants may take more than a single year before they bloom. These are likely one of those. This photo was created on May 5th.

Green Buds of Pink Lady’s Slippers

Though not yet pink, the pink lady’s slipper begins to take shape with a single green bud between the two leaves.

On April 21st I found this young pink lady’s slipper just beginning to take shape. There’s no pink yet, just a small green bud. But you can begin to see the flower it will become.

Developing Buds

The developing pink lady’s slipper buds are beginning to take on a slight shade of pink.

Different plants develop at different paces. Also on April 21st I found this cluster of young orchids at different stages. You can begin to see some pink in the foremost one. This is where the very first photo of the first hint of green was created. So it took 19 days to go from the first tip of green to this stage of growth.

Pink Lady’s Slippers in Full Bloom!

Finally, we see the pink lady’s slippers in all their glory.

The stage everyone is waiting for, when pink lady’s slippers show off what is sometimes a very vibrant shade of pink. These were all created on May 3rd, and several are the location of the first photo, so in 31 days these plants went from first hint of green to fully in bloom.

A front view of a cluster of pink lady’s slippers.

The same cluster of pink lady’s slippers as above seen from a distance.

A pair of pink lady’s slippers.

A closeup of a pink lady’s slipper in full bloom.

Fading Blooms

A cluster of pink lady’s slippers well past their prime.

On May 12th I found the first signs of fading blooms. This is a different set of plants than the other photos and seems to fade faster than they do, perhaps because it’s more exposed to the sun. You can see how the pink blossoms start to dry out, shriveling up and turning brown.

A closeup of the fading blossom of a pink lady’s slipper, drying, wilting, and turning brown.

And on May 25th all the blooms were either fading or gone. Below are a couple more examples of fading lady’s slipper blooms.

A pair of wilting pink lady’s slippers

A withered pink lady’s slipper. Just behind it is one where the remains of the bloom has already fallen.

After the Flowers Have Fallen

May 25th was when I found most of the flowers had already dropped from the stalks. The flowering season of the pink lady’s slipper is over. We must now wait another year to see these beautiful flowers bloom again, and I very much look forward to that time.

A pink lady’s slipper after the flower has fallen

A pink lady’s slipper after the bloom is gone. Look closely and you may notice an out-of-focus insect up top.

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Focus Stacking Pink Lady’s Slippers in 2022 /  by Todd Henson

Pink Lady’s Slipper (2022). This photo is the result of focus stacking 9 images to try to capture a significant portion of the bloom in focus.

One of the goals I had this season was to create a nice closeup photograph of one of our local orchids, the pink lady’s slipper, with an uncluttered out of focus background but showing a maximum amount of the blossom in focus. In the past I’ve tried this by experimenting with apertures to try to balance the amount of the blossom in focus against the amount of the background that’s out of focus. It’s been a challenge with many of the flowers I’ve found locally as they so often grow in very busy and brushy areas. So this year I decided to try using the focus stacking technique to accomplish my goal. This is a technique I’ve only rarely used, so I’m not an expert and am still learning.

Technique: Focus Stacking

Focus stacking refers to making many photographs of the same subject, one right after the other, while shifting the focus point for each photograph. In this case I used a very wide open aperture to keep the background nicely blurred. Then I focused on the closest point on the flower and made an image. Then I shifted the focus back just a little and made another photo, and repeated this until I was focused on the back of the flower. Essentially, each photo has a slice of the subject in focus and when you combine all of them in software you will, hopefully, get the entire subject in focus.

I’m not going to go into lengthy detail on the specifics of how to do this in software, but at a high level I did the following:

  • Selected all the individual photos in Lightroom and chose to edit as layers in Photoshop.

  • Selected all the layers in Photoshop, then auto-aligned the layers to line them all up correctly in case there was any slight movement between shots.

  • Auto-merged the layers, choosing the focus stacking option, to combine them all letting Photoshop pick the areas most in focus from each image.

  • Cropped the final merge to get rid of any inconsistent areas around the edges.

  • Performed any final edits in Lightroom.

The two photos I share today are examples of how I did. They are not perfect merges, though I am reasonably happy with the results. I’m ok with some things being a little out of focus but there are small areas of pink on each flower that I’d hoped would be in focus and are not. At some point I may spend more time on each to see if I might have captured those areas in focus in some of the images but the software just didn’t merge them correctly, and if so I would need to manually adjust the layers after the merge to try to capture those areas in focus. Or it’s also possible I just moved the focus a little too far such that I missed a slice, in which case I’ll need to try again next season.

Another Pink Lady’s Slipper (2022). This photos is the result of focus stacking 14 images, resulting in a 3.01 GB file.

Lessons Learned

  • If you are shooting with a wide open aperture and are close to your subject then adjust the focus in very small increments to assure you capture the entire subject. You can’t always go back and redo this later.

  • Try to pick days where there’s no wind, or at least very little. You don’t want the subject moving between each shot.

  • Use a sturdy tripod. Software can align the photos if they are not all perfectly aligned, but why risk problems? Use a tripod and get the shots as steady and lined up as possible while in the field.

  • Consider what software to use. I used Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop to perform all processing. This is a great combo but sometimes there are third party software packages that might do a better job with specific tasks. I’ve heard good things about Helicon Focus when it comes to focus stacking, but I’ve never tried it.

  • Consider how much memory and processing power this might take. I’m still working from a fairly old computer (12 years old) and this process did tax it. It became so memory constrained at times that the entire process seemed to stall and likely took far longer than it would on a more recent computer (I’ve been recently thinking about finally getting a new one).

  • Consider how much hard drive space this might take. Granted, space is relatively cheap in the scheme of things, but just realize that combining 14 images created on a 20 megapixel camera can result in a 3 GB merged file. If your subject requires even more images then the size will grow even larger.

  • Practice, practice, practice.

Conclusion

Focus stacking is a great technique that can help you create images that surpass the capabilities of whatever camera and lens you own. You can create very shallow depth of field photographs but still capture maximum detail in the specific areas you want. Modern software makes it relatively painless in most cases to create some nice images, but it can still take a little work, and it does help to practice the technique to better your skills and increase the chances of creating a final photo that exceeds your expectations.

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Lots of Lovely Lady’s Slippers /  by Todd Henson

A pink lady’s slipper, also sometimes called a moccasin flower

One of the joys of photographing nature is stumbling upon species in the wild for perhaps the first time. And when it comes to flowers that can be all the more special as some are only there for a very short period of time once a year. This year I was fortunate to be hiking with my father who has a keen eye and noticed several pink lady’s slippers right beside the trail hiding along the forest floor. And as is often the case, once we’d noticed one we began finding more. They were very difficult to photograph as most were in challenging locations and often mixed in with other more distracting plants or forest floor debris. But I had such a great time attempting to create some nice photographs with what nature presented us.

Lady’s slipper quartet

Lone lady’s slipper

There are several variety of lady’s slippers, also sometimes called moccasin flowers, one of the more common being pink lady’s slippers. All of the photos in this post are of pink lady’s slippers. They are a fairly large flower compared to most wildflowers in the area. And as you may tell from the look of them, they are of the orchid family. From what I’ve read it appears they flower between May and July, and all of these were found within the first two weeks of May (2021).

Pink lady’s slipper profile

Profile of a pink lady’s slipper

Fascinatingly, it can take years for a plant to mature from a seed. And, I suppose, that being the case it shouldn’t be too surprising that plants can live for over twenty years, though I am impressed by that. Being orchids, they are rather needy plants, requiring a particular soil fungus to grow. The lady’s slipper and the fungus have a symbiotic relationship, each benefiting from the other. They requires bees for pollination and, again, being an orchid, they have a rather complex method of attracting and being pollinated by the bees, which must enter the flower from one direction and exit from another where they will deposit any pollen they’re already carrying from other plants and pick up any from this one. Apparently they can sometimes perish inside the flower if they’re unable to find their way to the exit, though I hope this is uncommon.

Lady’s slipper sextet (in the shade)

Lady’s slipper sextet (in the sun)

Each individual flower doesn’t last all that long, though I don’t know for certain their typical life span. Flowers that were fully in bloom one weekend were either withered and brown or already fallen to the forest floor by the following weekend. But there were also new flowers found. Perhaps we’ll be fortune and find more of these now that we know what to look for. Or perhaps we won’t and this will have been the blooming period of this area. Only time will tell, but I look forward to finding out.

The latter days of the lady’s slippers

Aging gracefully

I hope you’ve enjoyed this brief glimpse at this lovely wild orchid, the pink lady’s slipper. Click on any of the images for a larger view.

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