Orchids In Chalk Grassland On Limestone In The Valley Gros Tienne Belgium Royalty-Free Stock Image

The Gros Tienne of Lavaux-Sainte-Anne, Belgium, is one of the most interesting limestone sites of the Calestienne. This hill, stretching from east to west for about 500 m, bears on its southern slope fragments of xeric grasslands, mesophilic grasslands with erect brome (Bromus erectus) and pinnate brachipod (Brachypodium pinnatum), a mesohygrophilous grassland with sedge tomentosa (Carex tomentosa) and succise (Succisa pratensis), thermophilic edges, a calcareous oak forest, etc. The place is renowned for its exceptional orchid population and is therefore very popular with botanists. The flagship species is certainly the extremely rare small-flowered epipactis (Epipactis microphylla) which finds in Gros Tienne one of its few localities currently known in Belgium. The perfoliated chlorine (Blackstonia perfoliata) and the willow-leaved inula (Inula salicina) are other floristic jewels of the site.