Plant of the Week 07/25/2005: Bird's-foot Trefoil (Lotus corniculatus)

Plant of the Week 07/25/2005

Bird's-foot Trefoil (Lotus corniculatus)

Lotus corniculatus Linnaeus

Photographed by: Chelsie Vandaveer
Credits: Bird's-foot trefoil photographed in Pendleton County, WV
Other Information: Olympus C-4000z

The bird's-foot trefoil (Lotus corniculatus Linnaeus) is a low growing perennial legume native to Europe, Asia, and northern Africa. It is a plant of nutrient poor and often rocky soils. In the early 20^th century, the plant was considered adventive in North America—accidentally introduced, but not established—and found only in "waste places and on ballast (rocks used for roadbeds)...and about the seaports...." The plant is now established in Canada and the U.S. both as a wildflower and as a pasture/hay crop.

Bird's-foot trefoil blooms from spring through autumn. The inflorescence is umbellate; it terminates with a crown of three to twelve brilliant yellow flowers often marked with red. The name, bird's-foot, comes from the thin, knobby seed pods, said to resemble the toes of a bird. Crow's-toes is another of the many names for this plant.

During the Middle Ages, the plant was considered magical and linked to Titania, Queen of the Fairies. The flowers were woven into wreaths with other magical plants to confer protection from mischievous spirits and fairies. (See Herbal Folklore, June 24, 2002).

(Compiled from: An Illustrated Flora of the Northern United States and Canada, N.L. Britton and A. Brown, 1913, reprinted 1970, Dover Publications, NY, and "Birdsfoot Trefoil", NewCrop, Horticultural Department, Purdue University, 1997)