The bee orchid: nature's mimic | Life and style | guardian.co.uk

The bee orchid (Ophrys apifera) can thrive in lawns, provided they are free from herbicides, moss killers and fertilisers. Photograph: Andy Byfield

The question that seems to be on everyone's lips this year is whether orchids - especially bee orchids – are having a particularly good year thanks to the unseasonable dankness that has blighted the lives of us gardeners. I can't speak for the whole country, but here at Byfield HQ, in deepest south Devon, they do seem to be bigger and better than previously. The head count is a healthy 25 flowering spikes this year, some nearly a foot in height, and as I write this, they are both still in unseasonally late flower and setting plenty of their remarkable, ribbed Hindenburg-shaped seed pods.