Gennardi 7th April 2023 (36° 0'10.41"N  27°54'9.45"E)

Down south today and the aim is to take a minor road off the former coast road just after Gennardi. The route is dictated by the road soon becoming a rough gravel track at a junction. We choose the route with tarmac. At a corner I spot some rather large Serapsias orientalis ssp. carica in a field as we are passing. Also preant are gone-over Ophrys ferdinand-regis and more orchids still in tight bud. I am actually veering towards these being Pyramidal Orchids. The field is abuzz with dragonflies, but the star is a Mediterranean House Gecko sunning itself and thinking it is sufficiently camouflaged in the vegetation.

Shortly after this the road come to a full stop at an active waste disposal site with KEEP OUT notices on the closed gates. Thus a big change of plan is needed. We head southwards.

This photo (from Weekend i)of Gennardi taken after the wildfires of July shows the extent of the burning in just one area. It does look as if most properties survived however. Our route took us along the road that runs parallel to the beach road before heading into the hinterland.

Kattavia 7th April 2023 (35°56'16.75"N 27°50'8.39"E)

A wide track leading off the main east to west road at the southern end of Rhodes holds promise with a variety of habitats on either side, but it isn`t until about 1 km down it that we strike lucky .... apart from a single Orchis sancta just coming into flower and just to one side. This was on my must see list! The main orchid spot is a stretch of phrygana rising up to a conical shaped summit. There is plenty to see.
The tongue orchid growing here are Serapsias orientalis ssp. carica. I did`nt know I could get excited about a big hairy tongue! From the bee orchid stable is Ophrys cinerophila and Op. ferdinand-regis - one looking less like an earwig orchid and more like a Cockroach Orchid! Delforge has an Iberian species looking like this, Ophrys vernixia, but that is too unlikley. however, Kretzschmar has an hybrid with Op. speculum looking similar. I have not seen a Mirror Orchid here, but this is not beyond a possibility. As for Op. cinerophila, I am not an expert on these Op. fusca sub-family species, but this species fits the bill in terms of location, habitat and appearance. Pedersen places this as Ophrys fusca ssp, cinerophila while Delforge does not include this even as a synonym.  Anacamptis pyramidalis is also present, as well as a good number of likely Orchis species still in bud. I am open to suggestions on any of those pictured below; two do look quite distinctive. However there are some coming into flower - Orchis fragrans. This does not explain all of them because those buds do look different. Perhaps some of them are more Orchis sancta. This theory is backed up by one orchid just in flower, and to me it seems to be a hybrid of Orchis sancta x O. fragrans. It certainly resembles the example in my book, and has flower features of both species.

 
Orchis sancta
 
Serapsias orientalis and Anacamptis pyramidalis
 
Ophrys ferdinand-regis and Op. cinerophila
 
Three different appearances for the Orchis species in bud
 
Orchis fragrans

Track leading away from the road

Middle of nowhere 7th April 2023 (36° 5'47.53"N  27°49'9.39"E)

This is on the road between Istrios and Profilia, near what used to be a ford, but now the road is built up. It should be a good orchid site in a strip of roadside pine woodland, but my information was published 20 years ago, and must have been witten up to 5 years earlier. Things have changed. No need to blame it all on climate change. Succession is a natural feature and all we find is some Ophrys rheinholdii. Nevertheless this is welcome as it is yet another new orchid for us. It is distinctive enough for Pedersen to agree on the species, though Laforge includes it as Ophrys straussii, a closely related taxon that the others do not recognise.