Ophrys apifera Bee Orchid

A Submediterranean-Subatlantic species which is one of our best known orchids, familiar to most people and always a joy to find. It is most commonly associated with short grassland especially where there is some calcareous influence and some disturbance, such as fixed dunes, roadside verges, lawns, amenity grassland, open mosaic habitats and quarries. Although it is predominanly a southern species in Britain, it has expanded its range northwars in recent decades, parhaps in response to ongoing climate warming. Nevertheless, it is absent from much of upland Wales and most common in coastal areas. It is also largely a coastal species in West Glamorgan, particularly well represented in Neath Port Talbot, with occasional inland records of plants growing in forest road verges, especially where the roads have been dressed with calcareous gravel. Of the eight varieties named in Britain, Var. bicolor , which has the familiar bumble-bee like flower with 3 erect, pink sepals, is the one invariably found in West Glamorgan. It has become more common in the county in the last 30 years and sometimes occurs in populations with many hundreds of individuals. Over a thousand individuals have been recorded in the population on Bryn Tip in some years.

Native