Crete, Orchids on Thorny Grasslands

collaborative AI.

Because I was once again preparing a trip to places where I had never photographed orchids before, and we only had four days, I carefully selected locations where several interesting species could be found close together. Ideally, they would also be in beautiful surroundings and not far from our accommodation, giving us a chance to photograph nice sunrises and sunsets in the field without spending too much time driving between locations.

I gathered information from reports by orchid enthusiasts from across Europe, from a book on the orchids of Crete and Rhodes, and from some advice I received from Vašek. I also went through the available verified data on iNaturalist. For the first time, while preparing the trip and putting all the information together, I also made use of artificial intelligence (ChatGPT).

I have to admit that if you know exactly what you want and what you want the result to look like, AI can be an excellent assistant after a few trial questions, some training and fine-tuning. It just takes a bit of experience to recognize when artificial intelligence is not doing exactly what you need and is simply “making things up.”

In fact, even compiling a reliable list of orchid species in bloom during the last week of March turned out to be the biggest challenge once again (that was something I had to do myself). I already knew exactly which species would be flowering at the end of March, but I still had to decide which species nomenclature we would follow throughout the trip.

Among the hills

Our first base was Spili, a small town in the heart of central Crete, known not only for its stone fountain with lion heads, but also for its excellent tavernas serving homemade cheese, vegetables and olive oil produced on the surrounding slopes. It was here, around Spili, that we found our first rich orchid sites – meadows and clearings in the pine forests were literally bursting with colour at the end of March. The air was fresh and fragrant with sage and thyme after the rains before our arrival, while the first wild tulips and irises were peeking out among the grass. The mornings were still crisp, with mist filling the valleys, but the sun soon illuminated the rolling landscape covered in flowering plants. The area was remarkably diverse – within just a few square metres we found representatives of the genera Ophrys, Orchis, Anacamptis and Serapias, including several endemic species.

Our second main base later became Archanes, on the eastern slopes of Mount Giouchtas, whose distinctive outline resembles the sleeping god Zeus. At the summit stands the small Afendis Christos church, along with the remains of a Minoan sanctuary, but the mountain is also home to surprisingly rich vegetation. From here, we set out to explore further sites – among vineyards, on slopes overlooking the sea, and across flowering pastures. The tavernas in Archanes had the same wonderfully relaxed atmosphere as those in Spili – fresh vegetables, feta and local wine. Thanks to the friendly service, we couldn't resist stocking up on local products at one of the village tavernas. And in the background, the snow-covered peaks of Psiloritis and the Lefka Ori added an almost alpine backdrop to our springtime orchid hunting. It was just a shame that we couldn't fit all of it into the same photographs with the orchids.

Orchids Among the Thorns

Although we found most of the orchid species I had been hoping to see in bloom at that time of year, photographing them was somewhat disappointing. I had hoped to find them in more attractive surroundings, with opportunities to incorporate more of the landscape into the compositions, but despite our best efforts, that proved difficult.

On most of the best orchid sites in Crete, the orchids often grow among low, thorny shrubs typical of the Mediterranean vegetation known as phrygana – a mosaic of drought-tolerant plants that could be described as a Mediterranean equivalent of a steppe grassland with shrubs.

The thorny bushes we had to manoeuvre our tripods through were often Sarcopoterium spinosum or smaller Cistus species. In some locations, low-growing thyme or dense clumps of drought-tolerant grasses dominated. Here and there, the flowers of the Cretan wild tulip (Tulipa cretica) appeared, along with the violet-blue flowers of Iris unguicularis subsp. cretensis. In the driest places we also found the tiny dark Iris tuberosa, with its distinctive green-and-black flowers that look more like insect wings than a traditional iris.

My main interest, however, remained the orchids. I'm glad Radu and Kaťa kept their eyes open for everything else too and broadened my horizons! As on other Mediterranean trips, I was delighted every time I found a new Ophrys species that I had never photographed before – and there were plenty of them: O. heldreichii, O. cretica, O. iricolor, O. omegaifera and Ophrys sphegodes subsp. spruneri. I was also pleased to find Orchis colina and Anacamptis borii. The disappointment was Orchis simia, which was only just beginning to flower – we found only a handful of plants.

Looking back, I keep thinking that when I have more time, perhaps in old age, when I no longer have any “commitments” in the Czech Republic, the ideal solution would be a car with a rooftop tent, flying to Crete in mid-March and returning at the end of April. This time, we only had a brief chance to “sniff out” Crete's orchid flora. And it was quite a whirlwind – at one point I even denied my clients dinner in a restaurant so that we could spend more time with the flowers at additional locations. They took it well, just like the 5:30 a.m. wake-up calls in complete darkness every morning.

Perhaps that's also why, after landing at Prague Airport, I had to wake them up so they would actually get off the plane... It was worth it!

If you are interested in joining me for similar orchid photography trips, next year we'll head to the island of Rhodes in early April to photograph its orchids.

For those who would like to discover orchids in the Czech Republic, I recommend my workshop in the White Carpathians or individual trips to photograph flowering orchids in the Czech Republic.

Related links

Articles about orchid photography
Orchid photographs on Shutterstock
Photography workshops
International photography trips