Bird’s Foot Trefoil

Bird’s foot trefoil, Lotus corniculatus, (corniculatus coming from the Latin for ‘with small horns’), is a common flowering plant throughout the British isles that has accumulated quite a collection of common names; ‘crow’s toes’, lady’s slippers’, ‘hen and chickens’ and ‘bacon and eggs’ being just a few that are still in regular use, most of these are derived from the appearance of its black seeds or yellow, slipper-shaped flowers.

’Bacon and Eggs’

Ubiquitous and widespread it grows in a wide variety of habitats including hedgerows, pastures, woodland edges and roadside verges. It can grow up to 40 cms high, and flowers from June to September, producing bright, egg-yolk yellow blooms , similar to those of sweet peas, which are often patterned with red streaks, giving the plant one of its most frequently used nicknames; ‘bacon and eggs’.

The ‘birds-foot’ in the plant’s common name refers to the talon-like appearance of its black seedpods, and ‘trefoil’ from the leaves, which, at first glance, seem to consist of three separate leaflets, but with closer inspection can be seen to be joined. A legume, or member of the pea family, Birds-foot trefoil tends to creep close the ground, but in meadows, where it has the support of other plants, it tends to grow taller, if the meadow is cut or grazed, however, the plant will revert to its creeping nature.

Source of nectar

Its bright yellow flowers are an important, protein-rich source of nectar for many of our native insects, especially bees and butterflies. Butterflies don’t play much of a role in pollinating the plant though as they feed by probing the flowers with their long, delicate proboscis, whereas less fragile insects such as bees and hoverflies, which tend to push their way into the flower to get at the nectar, do.

Birds-foot trefoil is also an important food plant for the caterpillars of several butterfly and moth species including Burnett moths, Common blues, Dingy skippers, Green Hairstreak and Wood White.

Nitrogen fixing

As it is so attractive to such a variety of wildlife, Birds foot trefoil is a very good plant to include in a wildlife garden, so is often found in commercial wildflower seed mixes sold for that purpose. It is also, as all legumes are, a ‘nitrogen fixer’, meaning it absorbs nitrogen from the air and secretes it from its roots, making it an ideal, and commonly used, plant for improving soil fertility, planted alongside clover to make for better grazing pastures and fodder.

As well as being used for improving soil fertility it is occasionally planted to control soil erosion and other uses include as a dye. All parts of Birds foot trefoil are poisonous, although it does have some medicinal uses in very small doses for treating heart problems and as an anti-inflammatory.

Once in a golden hour
I cast to earth a seed.
Up there came a flower,
The people said, a weed

(From The Flower, by Alfred Tennyson)

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