Distribution
Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Croatia, Estonia, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine

European endemic orchid found from southern Sweden to northern Spain, east to the Carpathians and in all the regions of northern Italy except Liguria. Altitude up to 2,700 m. (Bournérias and Prat 2005, Delforge 1995, GIROS 2009, Pignatti 1982, Rossi 2002, The Board of Trustees of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew 2010, Vakhrameeva et al. 2008).

Grasslands, meadows, marshes, flushed slopes, mountain pastures, road verges, grassy moorland and rarely xerophitic short grassland. It prefers moist to damp, calcareous substrates. This species grows in full sunlight and flowers from May to August.(Bournérias and Prat 2005, Delforge 1995, GIROS 2009, Pignatti 1982, Rossi 2002, Vakhrameeva et al. 2008).

Regionally Extinct in Czech Republic (Holub and Procházka 2000) and Luxembourg (Colling 2005)
Endangered in Hungary (Király 2007) and Ukraine (Red Book of Ukraine 2009)
Vulnerable in France (UICN France et al. 2010) and Germany (level 3- Ludwig and Schnittler 1996)
Near Threatened in Sweden(Gärdenfors 2010)
Least Concern in Switzerland (Moser et al. 2002)
Data Deficient in Croatia (Nikolić and Topić 2005)