Launch of the orchid season

There is nothing like seeing the first orchids flowering to lift the spirits - even today, when it felt like winter again. These magnificent Green-winged Orchids, Orchis morio, are once again beginning to flower amongst great sweeps of Cowslips and less obvious patches of Adder's-tongue at one of my local nature reserves. They grow mostly along the ridges of an ancient ridge-and-furrow field with plants liking much wetter conditions growing along the furrows. These orchids used to be quite common in damp meadows across most of the country, but 'improvements' like drainage and spreading fertiliser and ploughing for arable farming have left just a few special places for them.

Seeing these plants marks for me, and other botanists, the start of the orchid hunting season. As a group, they hold such a powerful fascination for wildflower lovers - you may see more being blipped.