WildBristol.uk - Discovering Wildlife in Bristol

White. Becoming rare. Spiranthes spiralis, Autumn Lady’s-tresses,growing in the short turf of the late-mown meadow on Clifton Down bythe Circular Road, a well-known current locality and perhaps the last remaining one on the Clifton side of the Avon Gorge. In the early 19thCentury it was frequently recorded in the vicinity of the Turnpike House and below, on what was later called Bridge Valley Road. Later, it was more often recorded opposite the Zoo, and it was plentiful there in 1977, after the droughts of the previous two years. It was also known at the head of the Gully (Ivor Evans in 1926). There are other old records of it on both Clifton and Durdham Down. White in his Flora of Bristol (1912) says it was ‘very thinly scattered’ and it was said to occur only sparingly in 1934 (3 or 4) and 1936 (2) but Miss Roper in one unspecified year between 1912 and 1934 said it was ‘Very abundanton Durdham Down’.