Bog orchid rediscovery

[dkchristi]

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[treecreeper]

Thanks for this happy story Mike

[davidbr]

Originally Posted by the young hunter

Love to know if anyone else has had some similar wildlife discovery moments this year.

Mike

Nothing on that level of significance, but I've managed to record 22 species this season that will be first records for the Bristol region, my "local patch", plus another 19 I'd thought were casuals but have survived for a second year. Hairy Canary-clover (Doryncium hirsutum) now has two plants at Abbey Wood Station, up from one and thriving, and looks established, we now have Balkan Spurge (Euphorbia oblongata) established in half a dozen local sites and Rosy Evening-primrose (Oenothera rosea), at Leigh Woods, and Veined Yellow-eyed-grass (Sisyrinchium laxum) are there for at least a second season and as far as I know the only currently established sites in mainland UK.

As you might have guessed, alien plants are my special fascination

[IanS]

Well done Mike!

I haven't found anything quite as good as that but have had 3 new finds for this year. Two occurrences of the white variety of early purple orchid, one in Oxfordshire and one in Norfolk and one discovery of a large population of twayblades on the edge of Norwich.

[ChrisR]

I was going to mention that I have a potential new species of fly for the UK ... but this is the wrong forum!

On Hartslock we had an exceptional year for the numbers of Monkey and hybrid Lady x Monkey orchids ... and the Monkey orchids continue to pop up in new places on the site, which is exciting ... not sure if that counts in the same league as rediscovering Bog orchids though

[the young hunter]

Originally Posted by ChrisR

I was going to mention that I have a potential new species of fly for the UK ... but this is the wrong forum!

On Hartslock we had an exceptional year for the numbers of Monkey and hybrid Lady x Monkey orchids ... and the Monkey orchids continue to pop up in new places on the site, which is exciting ... not sure if that counts in the same league as rediscovering Bog orchids though

Noway! I think I've spoken to you by email before! Is it Chris Raper?? I went to Hartslock this year to see the hybrids and my best photo is in the Gallery You're somewhat of a celebrity in the orchid community and can I just say, fantastic work at Hartslock, really need more people like you who understand the importance of conservation

Thankyou everyone for your replies though, really great to hear that people have been making new finds this year, if only personal, shows just how enthusiastic people are In terms of the Bog orchid I went to New Forest aswell this year in July to see them for the first time and found 9 plants on one bog so to see it for the second time in Wales was really a strike of luck. 2009 shall be my Bog orchid year

Mike

[ChrisR]

Originally Posted by the young hunter

Noway! I think I've spoken to you by email before! Is it Chris Raper?? I went to Hartslock this year to see the hybrids and my best photo is in the Gallery You're somewhat of a celebrity in the orchid community and can I just say, fantastic work at Hartslock, really need more people like you who understand the importance of conservation

Hi Mike ... stop - you're making me blush now

From a volunteer perspective I am in charge at Hartslock and I provide a lot of input to management decisions but BBOWT, the Wildlife Trust who own it, make the ultimate decisions and provide the funding. We have also benefited over the years from some excellent on-site wardens who used to put up with a fair bit of hardship; great volunteers who give up their free time to help out through the year; and the generous support of BBOWT, the site owners, and their reserve managers In particular Rod d'Ayala taught me just about everything I know about managing sites for orchids.

I get quite a lot of people contacting me about the orchids but I hope they don't mind if I don't remember all their names. I can usually recognize a face up on the reserve though and I have had the very great pleasure to show lots of enthusiastic people around ... and to learn a lot from them.

That said, I am just an expert on Hartslock ... I'm not a botanist and if you monitor the majority of my posts here on WAB and on my blog you'll see I am really an entomologist, so I am a bit of a botanical bluffer!

Anyway, glad you enjoyed the site and the orchids - we hope that the site continues to go from strength to strength We are making a start to all the winter work that visitors don't usually see - stuff like scrub management & fence/step repairs etc. - and the sheep are up there doing their work - nibbling back the undergrowth and pulling out all of my plastic orchid tags and spitting them about 1m away!! Grrrr ...

Chris R.