The Fertilisation of Orchids

Commemoration of Darwin's work on orchids

Kent Wildlife Trust manages Downe Bank, which is near Down House and was a favourite place of the Darwin family, who called it 'Orchis Bank' because of the many wild orchids which grew there. It is now part of the 'Downe Bank and High Elms' Site of Special Scientific Interest. Darwin's observations of local orchids and their insect pollinators gave him the evidence for co-evolution which provided the basis for the Fertilisation of Orchids." Experts have identified "Orchis Bank" as the species-rich setting encapsulated in the closing paragraph of On the Origin of Species, in which Darwin wrote: