A hot and dry June brings out the bee, fragrant and pyramidal orchids here on the North Downs; it seems a good year for them all even though the ground is parched. There are also droves of meadow browns, marbled whites and skippers. The dark green fritillaries are on the greater knapweed Centaurea scabiosa in…
Tag: Bee orchid
Summers up
A few images from a long hot summer that has now drifted into a damp and mellow autumn. Our local chalk grasslands are always rich in wildflowers and the diversity seems to be improving especially with a profusion of bee ochids in July. The green wheat fields turned yellow in the long summer drought; today…
Bees, spiders and monkeys
A hot day on the Folkestone Downs and the late spider orchids are up on the edge of the grassland; they are confined to a small fenced area just above the footpath, presumably to stop them being trampled by livestock or passers-by inadvertently squashing them while admiring the view. The spiders are rare in the…