Hartslock Birthday Treat

 

Historically, the moths have come good for me during this momentous time of the year which sees our wedding anniversary (golden only three years off...) and my birthday (rather a lot of those under my belt). But this time, the cold and often dull weather has proved an exception; the trap was all but empty on the anniversary nd there was no luscious surprise, as there has been in the past, as an extra birthday present.

I'm not grumbling, however. My first, composite, photo shows some of the overnighters on The Day and they are perfectly satisfactory.  From the top left reading across and then down, they are Turnip, Spectacle, Common Swift, Brindled Beauty, Brimstone, Cnephasia communana, Phtheochroa (try saying that) rugosana, Common Wainscot and Tawny Marbled Minor.

Birthday excitement was drawn instead this year from a picnic at Hartslock nature reserve on the hills overlooking the Goring Gap, a delicious stretch of the Thames, where the very rare Monkey orchid grows in profusion - delightfully, the collective noun for this sort of abundance of orchids is a 'swarm' (and that's for all orchids, noit just the Bee and Fly ones). There are also a small number of Lady orchids and a much larger one of an otherwise unknown hybrid between the two, nicknamed the 'Lonkey'.  As regular readers might expect, Penny and I were unable to tell them apart confidently, so here are some examples plus the helpful noticeboard.  I can't recommend a visit enough, parking in Goring and walking a mile and half downstream along the Thames Path before striking uphill for some 500 yards to the reserve. 

Hybrid I think, with the darker hood. Or is it a Lady as the 'legs' might be seen as a skirt or at least culottes 

Perhaps a Monkey, with the lighter hood?

The orchids are in glorious flower at the moment and will soon be succeeded by loads of Common-spotted (leaves of one, left), Pyramidal and other species, as per the notice below. I've sent some of our pics to iRecord in the hope that they will be ID-ed there but I'm not sure that the system works like that.  Fingers crossed. I can also strongly recommend a fascinating article on the subject by Prof Richard Bateman, a renowned expert with a very enjoyable, lively writing style.

Here are some of the flowers we saw and photographed, along with my wild but very slightly scientific guesses:

I'm guessing a hybrid from the dense darker-coloured blooms

Ditto though apologies for the blurring; it was rather a way beyond the tape cordon which it's important to respect to avoid trampling seedlings

Maybe Monkeys as lighter pink?

Hybrids I think, with the darker hood and paler 'arms' and 'legs' 

I think a Monkey as generally pale

Finishing flowering but intriguing

Ditto, and could this be a lady with the shorter petals more like a dress than legs (and no willie!)

I plan to carry on with my homework, using this handy close-up of the three contenders from the very helpful noticeboard at the reserve, pictured earlier in this post:

I love the orchids and the rarity of species like these but have to agree with Penny who spotted this Horsechestnut 'candle' on the path back to Goring and felt that it was their equal in beauty.

And now another insect. I spent so long staring at one orchid that my eyes re-focussed on a tiny little bright green character on a nearby leaf. I think that it's a Green Nettle Weevil, but that's an even harder game than identifying orchids.

Finally, we were down in London later in the week and in my current state of orchid enthusiasm, I called on the Nomura bank in the City to see if it was possible to visit their roof garden which is home to the UK's only colony of the Small-flowered Tongue orchid, found there in 2021 and still unexplained. No luck but the nearby free garden at 120 Fenchurch Street is a delight even if orchids have yet to seek it out.