Orchids continued........

Firstly I just want to say a huge thank you to everyone who helped send my little snail onto the spotlight page. I was so surprised, and it made my day. I will get round to replying to everyone and thanking you all for the stars and hearts over the weekend - promise xx
Half day today and...it wasn't raining so I decided to have a quick tripette to my favorite meadow on the South downs.
The meadow is alive with cowslips at the moment as well as Duke of Burgundy, Grizzled skipper and Dingy skipper Butterflies. I wasted an hour taking shots of the beautiful 'Dukes', including one female who sat on my finger before I went back down the lane to look for wild orchids.
There were Early purple orchids with their spotty leaves, and lots of spotty leaves promising a good show of Common spotted orchids in a few weeks, but best of all in my opinion were today's blip the Common Twayblade Neottia ovata.
The Common Twayblade is a terrestrial orchid native to Europe including the British isles. It grows in a variety of habitats, with 20-60cm flowering stems arising from two large opposite basal leaves (hence it's common name).
The flower stalk has between 15 and 100 flowers, which are small and green. The flower structure is interesting with the sepals and 2 side petals forming a fairly open hood 5-6mm long, the labellum or lip (central petal) is 7-15 mm long and divided into 2 lobes at the end.
personally I think the flowers look like little men in old fashioned bonnets running around in a panic!!
The flowers are pollinated by a wide range of insects.
I think this is a really beautiful little orchid, and well worth seeking out if you get chance.