Woodcock orchid
This Ophrys species is propably the only one which is not named after an insect or a region but after a bird. The plant has a height of 10 to 50 cm. The sepals of the 3 to 12 flowers are spreaded. The petals are either small and triangular or elongate. The three-lobed labellum is bent and elongate, the marked protuberances are pointed and hairy. The broad appendage is bent forward.
Taxonomic discussion
The scientific description was done by the Spain botanist Antonio Joseph Cavanilles (1745-1804) in his opus Icones et Descriptiones Plantarum quae aut sponte in Hispania crescunt aut in hortis hospitantur (1793).
White colour of flowers
The sepals may be white, rose, light-red or violet. The dark-brown labellum has a marked pattern. In the case of reduced or missing colour pigments, the flowers have a yellowish or light-green labellum.
Habitat, bloom and distribution
Ophrys scolopax grows on meadows and sunny grasslands in the Western Mediterranean, up to heights of 1700 m. The flowering is from March until June.