This is not a rarity but because I so rarely go botanising on the chalk downlands of southern England, I have seen it only once before. In deepest Kent, on Forestry Commission land, the thin chalky soil will not support trees so the bank has been left to grow as nature intended. Here it is plentiful alongside, Orchis purpurea (Lady Orchid), Dactylorhiza fuchsii (Common Spotted Orchid), Plantanthera chlorantha (Greater Butterfly Orchid) and earlier in the year Orchis mascula (Early-purple Orchid).

It is locally frequent on some sites in southern England but strays only as far as the Welsh borders and doesn't grow in Scotland or Ireland.