Gymnadenia odoratissima(L.) Rich.

Short spurred fragrant orchid

WFO wfo-0000976644 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Gymnadenia odoratissima, photographed by agosti
fig. a agosti, CC0 1.0 / 2021-07-23 / obs. 145769481

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

Native range 19 botanical countries

Regions where Gymnadenia odoratissima is native: Austria, Baltic States, Belarus, Belgium, Central European Russia, Czechia-Slovakia, East European Russia, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, NW. Balkan Pen., Poland, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine AustriaBaltic StatesBelarusBelgiumCentral European RussiaCzechia-SlovakiaEast European RussiaFranceGermanyGreeceHungaryItalyNW. Balkan Pen.PolandRomaniaSpainSwedenSwitzerlandUkraine
Native distribution of Gymnadenia odoratissima, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Austria AUT EUROPE
Baltic States BLT
Belarus BLR
Belgium BGM
Central European Russia RUC
Czechia-Slovakia CZE
East European Russia RUE
France FRA
Germany GER
Greece GRC
Hungary HUN
Italy ITA
NW. Balkan Pen. YUG
Poland POL
Romania ROM
Spain SPA
Sweden SWE
Switzerland SWI
Ukraine UKR

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Flowering 144 in flower of 144 examined

Proportion of examined Gymnadenia odoratissima in flower, by month
Month In flower Examined Share 95% interval
Jan 0 0 too few examined
Feb 0 0 too few examined
Mar 0 0 too few examined
Apr 0 0 too few examined
May 1 1 too few examined
Jun 44 44 100% 92% to 100%
Jul 93 93 100% 96% to 100%
Aug 6 6 100% 61% to 100%
Sep 0 0 too few examined
Oct 0 0 too few examined
Nov 0 0 too few examined
Dec 0 0 too few examined

Peak flowering in Jun. Each bar is the share of Gymnadenia odoratissima observations in which someone actually recorded the reproductive state and found the plant in flower, not the raw number of flowering records. That distinction matters: people observe plants far more in spring than in winter, so a bare count of flowering records partly measures when people go outside. Dividing by the number examined removes that. 144 of 144 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. 9 months have fewer than 5 examined observations, so no proportion is drawn for them. This is still a global aggregate and not a forecast for your garden: the same species flowers on different dates in different hemispheres. Where a species has fewer than 30 flowering records we do not draw this chart at all. Computed from 10.15468/dl.cgje2x.

Also published as 20 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Gymnadenia odoratissima f. borealis (Rchb.f.) Soó
  • Gymnadenia odoratissima f. carpathica (Simonk.) Soó
  • Gymnadenia odoratissima f. carpathica (Simpnk.) Soó
  • Gymnadenia odoratissima f. stenostachya (Schltr.) Soó
  • Gymnadenia odoratissima lus. alba Zimm.
  • Gymnadenia odoratissima var. borealis Rchb.f.
  • Gymnadenia odoratissima var. carpathica Simonk.
  • Gymnadenia odoratissima var. carpathica Simpnk.
  • Gymnadenia odoratissima var. ecalcarata Rchb.f.
  • Gymnadenia odoratissima var. idea Goiran
  • Gymnadenia odoratissima var. macrocheilea Westerl.
  • Gymnadenia odoratissima var. stenostachya Schltr.
  • Gymnadenia odoratissima var. suaveolens Nyman
  • Gymnadenia rhodopea Formánek
  • Habenaria odoratissima (L.) Franch.
  • Orchis conopsea subsp. odoratissima (L.) Bonnier & Layens
  • Orchis erubescens Zucc.
  • Orchis erubescens Zucc. ex Lindl.
  • Orchis odoratissima L.
  • Satyrium odoratissimum (L.) Wahlenb.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
  4. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.