We have reached the 1st June 2024, and usually we are reaching "peak" main season, with orchids from Early Spiders and Purples through to Late Spiders and all inbetween in flower.
The reality is that both Early Purple and Early Spiders are now but a memory, as are Green Wing. Lady Orchids are fading fast, as are Fly Orchids too. Late Spiders that should just be coming into flower have been seen since the second week of May, and will soon be at their peak too. Pyramidal, Lizards are showing well at Sandwich Bay, both a couple of weeks early.
Southern and Early Marsh are at their peaks too.
Of the highlights of the season, it has been an Early Spider down on the Hoe, seen in mid-April, not quite a recognised var as such, but a stunning spike, nontheless.
The green Fly did appear and was seen by a friend, but within a couple of days had gone. Either nibbled or worse, stolen by a colector.
The early season, and its ongoing earliness is down to the wet and damp winter and early Spring, but is also responsible for the plague of snails and slugs are are rampaging across meadows, downs and gardens, mnching on rare and not so rare plants the same.
A new colony of Green Wing near to home, might only have been two plants, but still good to see as they spread southwards down the coast.
Fly Orchids in flower in the first week of April, I saw one on flower on the 11th.
We might not see another season like it, or it might be the new normal.
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