Flowers of the South Downs; things to look out for today: Autumn Lady's-tresses orchids

 Tiny, exquisite Autumn Lady's-tresses orchids are flowering now in sympathetically maintained churchyards and on the Downs of Sussex.

 Look out too for the Silver-spotted Skipper.

 Scabious flowers and "The Pride of Sussex", Round-headed Rampion are in glorious profusion now as well.

Butterflies of the Surrey Hills; Chalk Hill Blue, Adonis Blue, Meadow Brown, Small Heath, Treble-bar Moth, Drinker Moth?, Hornet and bees at Ranmore.

The steep, south-facing chalk hills at Ranmore were fabulous for insects, especially butterflies and moths yesterday.  

Scores of Chalk Hill Blues were flying around.

Near the middle of the photo' above is a tiny, vivid blue speck:

an Azure Blue, a little battered and missing areas of scales from its wings yet stunningly blue none the less.

Meadow Browns were present in significant numbers; a female above and a male below.

Smaller and more orange than the Meadow Browns were some Small Heaths, above.

This might be a Treble-bar Moth, Aplocera plagiata, whose caterpillars feed on St John's Wort, which food plant was in flower still.

Is this a Drinker Moth?  Any ideas anyone?

Common Carder bees were common still.

And this looks like a male Red-tailed bumblebee.

A Hornet seemed to be scraping wood from this dead stem to expand its nest cells.

There is such a variety of insect and plant life on this hillside, which being steep is a good opportunity for some vigorous exercise too!

Native orchid, Autumn Lady's-tresses, Spiranthes spiralis, flowering now on unimproved grasslands on the Downs and sympathetic churchyards.

The UK's native orchid, Autumn Lady's-tresses, Spiranthes spiralis, is flowering now on unimproved grasslands on the Downs and in sympathetically managed churchyards like this one in East Sussex.

 Resembling plaited hair, the leaves have withered before the flower spike appears.

 The flowers are tiny and easily overlooked; yet are exquisite to anyone enjoying the amazing beauty and diversity of our native flora.

An orchid fan is opera tenor, Francois Piolino on a rest day from singing in Ravel's Double bill at Glyndebourne this week.  He was pleased to see and photograph this delightful flower for the first time.
See also http://sussexrambler.blogspot.co.uk/2010/09/autumn-ladys-tresses-orchids.html