Belgarums are mutants. but I know what you mean Rich and agree. Perhaps best to say 'aberrations' as whether the cause is inherited or acquired is unknown. Could be virus, aphid or similar, or weather at a critical point in the flower development.
The point I didn't make very well Steve is that
belgarum is a named variant with a full description; such plants have a consistent shape and patterning, with little variability between the individual flowers, and tend to occur for a number of years and in numbers at a number of sites.
Belgarum in particular is relatively common and consistent in shape and lip patterning between sites ie it follows the description. It is one of the small number of forms in which Bee orchids regularly occur.
They may have mutated in the past but they are stable.
You can occasionally find odd individual plants that resemble
belgarum but do not totally meet all the described criteria, but your plants aren't those.
Your plant on the other hand is a 'one-off' aberration, you would be hard pressed to find anything similar at any other site or even another plant; often it is just one flower with the other flowers perfectly normal. Such one-offs are not that hard to find in
apifera but they all look different; they are one of the bonuses of looking at lots of Bees. I've got a whole collection of photos of Bees that have abnormal lip patterning or shape, and that's before you start on those with the wrong number or misshapen petals and sepals.
Were both your flowers on the same plant? If not what did the other flowers on each plant look like?
Rich
