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Horseshoe vetch
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HORSESHOE VETCH
Hippocrepis comosa
Family LEGUMINOSAE
May be found on chalk hills and stony pastures, but only in England , and in Ayr and Kincardine. It does not occur in lreland. On the North Downs in Surrey it will be met with in great profusion.
It is a perennial plant with a woody rootstock from which rise manvy branching stems, either short or spreading along the ground, six inches to a foot long.
The leaves are pinnate, though the leaflets are not so numerous. They vary from four to eight pairs, with an odd one at the tip, the lowest pair at a distance from the stem.
The yellow flowers are borne at the top of the curved flower-stalks, in the form of umbels, each umbel consisting of from six to ten blossoms.
They are succeeded by rough, jointed seedpods, serpemine in shape, about an inch long, ending in a fine point.
The flowering period is from May to August.
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It is an annual plant with erect, slender stems extending to about one and a half feet high. Its narrow lance-shaped leaves are arranged alternately and at a Horseshoe vetch distance from eachother. The flowers are large, and purplish-blue in colour, borne in a loose terminal corymb. Five is the number dominating the structure of the flower; sepals, petals Horseshoe vetch, stamens, glands, ovary (five cells), styles - all fives. The flowering period is in June and July.
The leaves are divided into three stalked segments, each one lobed and toothed, the central one extending beyond vetch Horseshoe the others which gives the whole leaf a somewhat ovate form. The flower-stalk is furrowed, and the burnished, golden-yellow flower consists of distinct sepais and petals, normally five Horseshoe vetch of each. The sepals are turned downwards, nearly or quite touching the stalk. The cup-shaped petal is provided with a little scale towards the base, which forms a pocket Horseshoe vetch containing nectar. Most of the species possess acrid and poisonous juices which cause them to be avoided by browsing animals.
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