NORTH DOWNS & BEYOND

Green Hound's-tongue is a rare plant of restricted range - however, there are a few places where it can be common, such as Brockham, at the foot of the North Downs (not far from Box Hill). Within its range, this species will appear in good number where there has been some woodland edge clearing, and this is the case at Brockham. This morning there were at least 1,000 plants spread along a 100m stretch (and going 15m into the wood). It was the commonest species within this area and boasted some of the largest and most 'flowered' specimens that I have seen. Most of the open ground had individual plants generously spaced out, but in one or two places over 100 plants were crowded together. I do not doubt that a thorough search of the area would reveal many more...

I'm guilty of taking Man Orchids for granted. In 'my' part of Surrey they aren't exactly common, but there are quite a few places that you can go to and expect to see them at the right time of year. Today saw me visiting one such place, a small meadow not far from Box Hill. I could only find the one, but that was good enough. The number of Common Spotted Orchids here was low and Fragrant Orchids were only just starting to show themselves. An hour later found me on the other side of Box Hill where I came across 39 more spikes of Man Orchid in a place that I hadn't recorded them before. This site had moderate numbers of Common Spotted and Fragrant Orchids - Common Twayblades were in fine number across the greater Box Hill area. Other botanical highlights included Common Figwort, White Helleborine, Greater Butterfly Orchid (17 spikes), Sainfoin, Common Hound's-tongue, Tutsan, Hieracium maculata (in profusion at Brockham Quarry), Viper's Bugloss, Yellow-...