[regor]

I feel totally confused about the current thoughts on the taxonomy of British and Irish Dactylorhiza orchids.

Is there anyone out there who could please summarise the current thinking on species, subspecies and varieties?

[rmielcarek]

Originally Posted by regor

I feel totally confused about the current thoughts on the taxonomy of British and Irish Dactylorhiza orchids.

Is there anyone out there who could please summarise the current thinking on species, subspecies and varieties?

Latest thinking on the marsh orchids [Bateman and Denholm, 2012, New Journal of Botany, vol2 no 1] gives four species as follows;

D praetermissa
ssp praetermissa, var junialis
ssp schoenophila (basically plants from East Anglia and south England previously considered to be Pugsleys)

D kerryensis
var occidentalis

D purpurella
var cambrensis

D traunsteinerioides
ssp traunsteineriodes
ssp francis-drucei, var ebudensis

Rich M

[regor]

Thank you for this Rich. Now I can begin to try to get my head round them all!

[Ghostly Vision]

I should add to Richards succinct summary that the ebudensis ssp of Pugsley's is what used to be considered a separate species, the Hebridean marsh orchid, for example in Harrap.

Sean