Out for Orchids

Our native orchids are among the most beautiful, interesting and appealing of our wildflowers and I have had three very enjoyable outings to see them recently. The Lesser Twayblade had frustrated me for several years. I knew from friends that there was a small population in a remote area in Co. Wicklow – I had …

A Good Orchid Day

The journey from home to Gortlecka Crossroads, in the heart of The Burren in Co. Clare, takes two hours and forty minutes according to the directions from Google maps and to drive there and back in one day would be a hard day indeed. The offer of travelling part of the way and taking a …

You Little Beauty!

I was a small child, always the youngest and smallest in class in my school days, and one teacher constantly sought to console and encourage me by telling me that the best goods came in small parcels. There may be a nugget of truth in the saying and we certainly delight especially in beauty in …

There will be days like this!

It was a scorcher of a Sunday, with temperatures in the high 20s, and after a two hour drive we had a thirty-minute walk up a hillside in the Glen of Aherlow, Co. Tipperary, in search of the very rare Small White Orchid. There are scarce records of sightings in north Co. Tipperary and there …