Where’s the safest place to keep something away from prying eyes? A bank, obvs.
The small-flowered tongue orchid, Serapias parviflora to you and me, was thought to have been extinct in the UK after the previous colony at Rame Head in Cornwall was destroyed in 2009 as a result of land mismanagement. Normally a native of the Mediterranean basin and the Atlantic coast of France, Spain, and Portugal, it has been found in the roof garden above the 11th floor of the Nomura bank in London’s Angel Lane.
There are fifteen of them and they grow up to 30 centimetres in height and produce between three and 12 orange flowers. I hope they flourish.
Of course, the discovery raises the question: why did it take so long to find them? And is the roof garden just a piece of virtue signalling that no one takes any notice of?
windowthroughtime 