Chalk Fragrant Orchid: (Gymnadenia conopsea) From the busy road side verge of the B6403 I headed down to a little gem of a nature reserve in Barnack situated about 11 km north west of Peterborough.
I was tipped off by @ukorchids via twitter, who said this was top place to see man orchids. I highly recommend people to follow, great information and lots of sharing of orchid images
Arising from the rubble of a medieval quarry, the Hills and Holes is one of Britain's most important wildlife sites with grassy slopes are home to a profusion of wildflowers.
Barnack's rich flora supports a wide variety of wildlife, especially insects, and a number of nationally scarce species are found. But the star of the show are its rich diversity of flowers, with over 300 species recorded on site.
While here I spotted dozens of fragrant orchid all well sign posted and many behind several non-go areas.
Formerly the common fragrant orchid, marsh fragrant orchid and heath fragrant orchid were classified together. They were then separated into three sub-species before their current recognition as three distinctly different species.
The species do align with the habitats indicated by their name grassland, Barnack Hills & Holes is a chalk grassland so we have chalk fragrant orchids.
The site is especially famous for the Pasque flower, a purple anemone that blooms in large numbers in spring, unfortunately I was too late to see them in all their glory as they had gone to seed when I arrived.
Although I missed the Pasques I did spot horseshoe vetch, common rockrose, hairy rockcress, dropwort and the very strange looking knapweed broomrape.
Man Orchid: There were plenty of man orchid about too, many of which were looking past their best.
Loved this place, I spoke to several locals who were lovely.
