I have mentioned a few times how the Loos area is rich in orchids. There’s still a few orchids species I haven’t seen here, but I know someone who knows where all of them grow – so today I got a guide to show to me to the lesser twayblade (Listera chordata). It’s a small flower with green or red-brown blooms and grows in mossy spruce forests, so it’s easily overlooked even if you’re standing right in front of one. Which I reckon I have done many a time, because it’s not a rare orchid by any means. So when we arrived to the site, my guide pointed me in the right direction in the forest and told me to find them – and I did! Oh joy! And having seen one, I saw plenty, suddenly they were no longer blending in and hiding but I saw them everywhere, even when we moved to another place to look for other flowers I still kept spotting the lesser twayblades.

We made an attempt at finding bog orchids (Hammarbya paludosa) but it was probably too early for them and we came up empty. But we did see plenty of other orchids; early marsh-orchid was already in bloom, twayblade and spotted orchid buds, and then a surprise re-union with the coralroot orchid which I’ve so far only seen in the mountains. It’s not even rare in this region, but just like the lesser twayblade, I’ve just simply not seen it.

Such a great day! Even the rain had the courtesy of waiting until we were already driving home.