Rare flower found in wild for first time in nearly 100 years

A DECADES-LONG bid to bring back one of Britain’s “rarest and most impressive” wildflowers has seen success with the first new plant found in the wild in nearly 100 years.

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Conservationists now hope the lady’s-slipper orchid, which came close to vanishing from the English countryside, could one day be restored across its former range.

The striking lady’s-slipper orchid was believed to be extinct in the UK by the early 20th century, due to over-collection by plant hunters gripped by the Victorian orchid craze, and loss of its habitat.

But discovery of a single plant in a remote location in the Yorkshire Dales in 1930 prompted round-the-clock protection by decades of dedicated volunteers, and later efforts to propagate and reintroduce orchids to former haunts.

Two years ago, Yorkshire Wildlife Trust secured a grant from Natural England’s species recovery programme to ramp up the work protecting the habitat, rearing many new orchids and reintroducing plants into suitable habitat.