Yellow Bird's Nest DSC_3633
Yellow Bird's Nest / hypopitys monotropa. Stanton Sidings, Derbyshire. 11/08/17.
I made an exciting discovery at my local brownfield site this week....29 flower spikes of Yellow Bird's Nest. This intriguing, transient plant lacks chlorophyll. It derives nutrients by parasitism, using mycorrhizal fungi that are attached to the roots of nearby trees. It is therefore dependent upon both the fungus and vascular plant association for its entire life.
I have never seen YBN growing at this site before but have found out it can exist underground for many years before appearing. It only emerges to flower and because of this, is thought to be under recorded and classed as 'Scarce to Rare'.
In Derbyshire it seems that records of it are confined to the mid-county and White Peak areas.
Not the easiest of situations to make images in....I had to lay on leaf litter under a dense canopy of scrub and use my on-camera flash.
(Apologies to the lady dog walker who nearly passed out at the sight of what she assumed to be a dead body!)
BEST VIEWED LARGE.
Yellow Bird's Nest DSC_3633
Yellow Bird's Nest / hypopitys monotropa. Stanton Sidings, Derbyshire. 11/08/17.
I made an exciting discovery at my local brownfield site this week....29 flower spikes of Yellow Bird's Nest. This intriguing, transient plant lacks chlorophyll. It derives nutrients by parasitism, using mycorrhizal fungi that are attached to the roots of nearby trees. It is therefore dependent upon both the fungus and vascular plant association for its entire life.
I have never seen YBN growing at this site before but have found out it can exist underground for many years before appearing. It only emerges to flower and because of this, is thought to be under recorded and classed as 'Scarce to Rare'.
In Derbyshire it seems that records of it are confined to the mid-county and White Peak areas.
Not the easiest of situations to make images in....I had to lay on leaf litter under a dense canopy of scrub and use my on-camera flash.
(Apologies to the lady dog walker who nearly passed out at the sight of what she assumed to be a dead body!)
BEST VIEWED LARGE.