The Quest (part 5)

Of Frogs and Bogs. Or Fens, actually.

Saturday 25th June 2016

I have been orchiding for so long, so species have changed families, the Frog is now a dacht. Dactylorhiza viridis.

Anyway, Saturday dawned clear and bright, and we should have been out snapping orchids at the seaside in Pegwell and Sandwich Bays, but instead, we are to get in the car and drive to Essex. To pick up a turntable. But what with the great weather forecast, I got thinking about orchids again. THere is an orchid, but then there always is, that is probably extinct in Kent, a small green orchid, called the Frog Orchid, that used to grow in Dover. Or that was the last known site. Indeed a couple of years ago, Jools and I went to look for it, now that I have seen them in real life, we might go again, if there is time. Anyway, checking the orchid book, the best site in EA for them was one we have visited before, Wink's Meadow in Suffolk, so the plan was to drive up, look for the orchids, then drive down, pick up the turntable and be home maybe for 5.

In fact the plan had bee to collect the turntable first, then drive to Suffolk, but as we were both awake just after 5, and had breakfast and coffee and we ready to go just after six, we thought we would just get going.

A pleasant drive up the M20 to Dartford, no delays and only a few poor drivers. Through the tunnel and into Essex, turning off to go up the old A12, we saw it was jammed up right from the roundabout, so we drive all the way back round, back onto the motorway so we could go up the M11 instead. When I thought about it, there was little difference. So, we cruised past Stanstead at 72mph, just slow enough for the sat nav not to bleep at us. Up past Saffron Walden, up the A11, then along to Bury St. Edmunds, and finally up the familiar road to Diss. THis used to be my old stomping ground, and when we did turn off towards Metfield, we were just 14 miles from Bungay.

We know the way so well now, along narrow lanes to the village, then along through some attractive old houses, out onto the perry track of an old USAF airbase, then finally up a dead end lane to the reserve. The road was partially flooded, so we parked on an old aircraft dispersal pan, got out put our walking boots on in case it was wet in the meadow, it was.

THe meadow isn't that large, but by June it is pretty overgrown, and the Frogs are small, about a foot tall, so finding them was going to be tricky. The first thing was to walk round the edge of the site to see if we could see any; that took 45 minutes. We saw hundreds, if not thousands of Pyramidals, some Southern Marsh and a few Common Spotted. But no Frogs. We had been there nearly an hour, and even after following some tracks across the centre of the meadow, we could find nothing.

When we were at the site for the first time, I went into the village shop to ask for directions as we could not find it, and one of the assistants was a volunteer there, and she had mentioned the frogs, but we were too early. So, I asked Jools to drive back to the village to see if she was there and to ask for directions where on the site the Frogs were. I stayed behind to look. I had found a small colony of Southern Marsh, so I hoped that's where the Frogs would be. So, Jools went off and I looked. With no luck.

I followed the path into the centre of the meadow and looked closely. Still no luck. I heard Jools return, and I looked down. There was a small orchid spike. I stooped down and the lip revealed it to be a Frog. I had found one, at least. Jools showed at the gate, laden with sausage rolls and lashings of fizzy pop, so I waved at her to come over to see.

All I had to do now was to wait for the sun to break through the cloud cover, so I waited and waited until the sun did break through, and I got my shots. But then we looked around and saw many more spikes, I suppose about a dozen in all, some spikes still emerging, others nearly fully open. But I did not take shots, in case of damaging any more spikes. I did get shots of the single Bee also in the area, and with that, we walked back to the car.

Tuesday 19th June 2018

It was said by my dead old Dad many years ago, that flies only feed on rotten meat. This was as Mum and myself were always bitten to buggery by various insects during our holidays in Wales and Scotland. Mosquitoes, gnats, flies, bees, wasps and other such flying, buzzing wee beasties would come and feast, mainly on our sweet East Anglian blood.

Last year in Scotland, the infamous Scottish midges covered me in bits as I stood on a hill in Glenfinnan, and earlier this year, Danish midges, mozzies and flies ate lots of me whilst I stood on a wooded hillside.

All this went through my mind as I packed on Monday, and I searched the house for Jungle Formula. I found none, but thought to myself, maybe it wouldn't be as bad as that.

I was wrong. It was Denmark all over again.

But before we get to that point, I had to get to the site. Oh yes, the site. I can't mention it by name, but a simple online search of the locations were the little orchids grow will quickly turn it, and other up. But anyway, I promised not to mention it, so, I won't. But so as you know.

The site was north of Great yarmouth, and getting from Mum's to there meant going through Great Yarmouth and dealing with its dreadful traffic jams. Like Lowestoft it has just two bridges over the river, and traffic quickly builds up as rush hour proceeds, so after getting up at half six, I say I'm going to leave straight away, with no breakfast in order to get through the town with no delays.

In fact I was relieved to go, I repeated how I felt, and Mum was still shocked. But, there is no time now for messing around, life is what it is, and I am what I am. And need no excuses.

No traffic in Yarmouth, and most of the traffic on the Acle straight was heading into town, but even driving away there was a solid line of cars, even if we were driving at 50 mph. Once at Acle I only had 15 minutes to go, so I stop at a garage, get breakfast, a snack and a litre of iced coffee, then go on until I find a place to park on the side of the road.

It was seven, and I had two and a half hours to kill.

I eat, drink, and listen to the radio and watch the traffic go by.

I sit there watching the rain clouds roll in, then drop ever-increasing amounts of rain on the car. Not what was forecast at all.

At quarter to nine I drive the last few miles to the meeting point, which was down a long dead end lane and then park in a farmyard. Rain continued to fall, and the light was awful. Oh dear, and was I in the right place?

When a second car arrived, I knew I was. The driver asked, are you here for the orchids? Yes I was.

As a third car arrived, a bloke came out from one of the barns and shook our hands, welcome, he said. Would you like a brew? We would.

So we go into the warehouse, all full of dangerous looking knives and machetes, and all the other stuff needed to keep the reserve open and accessible for the people who work there. We have a brew, chat and once the final guy turned up on his bike, we put wellies on and set off out into the rain and the countryside.

We walked over farmland, past casually interested highland cattle, through a gate and onto the fen.

I know now, that fen is alkali and a bog, acidic. Who knew?

The fen is a mat of plants and centuries of compressed dead vegetation floating on fresh water, the mat is several feet thick, and so when you walk over it, it bounces. No firm ground here, just bouncing, and when you stood still, water seeped up. Water was still falling from the clouds too. But there was brightness, and hope.

And there was insects. We stopped to put on repellant, but little did I know that the buggers were already biting through my t short on my back, and only later would I discover the dozens of bites when they started to itch.

As we walked, our guide pointed out so many different rare wild plants and flowers, but soon we came to the object of us being there; the Fen Orchid. It is a small, green plant that you can very easily miss, as it grows among taller vegetation, and is green. The background vegetation is also green. Get the picture?

We search for more, and indeed find many more spikes, some bigger than others, and easier to find and photograph.

The rain had stopped, so we began to enjoy the yomp across the fen; fus us orchidists, there were Early Marsh and Southern Marsh orchids everywhere, and hybrids of the two, of course, as well as ever more exotic and rare plants, flowers and grasses. I took many pictures and our guide sent us a list of what we saw, but I have to marry the two!

With three metres to go before we left the fen, I discovered one of the "holes", gaps between the tussocks and sank knee deep in mud. I was stuck, but the guide came, told me to pull my foot out and he yanked on the boot to free it, allowing me to put it back on and get to dry land!

We see two Marsh Harriers, flying low over the fen looking for food. A cuckoo flies past, calling all the while, even perching in a nearby tree, but conditions not good enough to get a shot. One of te other snappers is a twitcher, so keeps us all updated with the calls of birds we hear, one of which he assured us was a Grasshopper Warbler.

All interesting stuff.

We walked over the short stretch of farmland, disturbing a barn owl from its nest in an outbuilding, we stood and watched as it lazily flew away over the fields to the woods in the distance. It had not made a sound.

We go over a floating walkway to see some really rare stuff, tiny plants that eek out a living in the clear, clean water below the fen. Fur us as we walked off the walkway was the danger that the tussocks were the only safe places, so we have to walk from one to the other.

Finally, we walk back onto dry land again, walking gown a lane between two ditches, and in the hedgerow, we could see the unmistakable shape of a swallowtail butterfly. As we walk towards it and angle to get shots, it flies away. We saw just one others, flying high over the trees well out of reach of the camera.