Melampyrum pratense
Common cow-wheat
How do you recognise common cow-wheat?
The slender stem is dark and often reddish, and the leaves are narrow and very dark green. The two-lipped, long-tubed yellow-white flowers, about 15 mm, grow in pairs with a long gap between each pair.
What is it confused with?
Wood cow-wheat has showy violet bracts under its flowers, where this species has green ones. The gaps between flower pairs are also clearly longer here.
Where does common cow-wheat grow, and when does it flower?
Common cow-wheat grows, as its Finnish name says, in heath forest, but also on rocks and sometimes on rather dry meadows. Flowering is in July and August.
Can you collect it for a herbarium?
Common cow-wheat is very common in heath forest, and one flowering shoot is enough. Careful. Do not taste this plant.
Did you know?
Cow-wheats are hemiparasites: they photosynthesise but draw part of their food from the roots of neighbouring plants. Ants spread the seeds, drawn by an oily appendage on each one.
Where does common cow-wheat grow in Finland?
The map shows where the species has been recorded. Darker squares mean more observations.
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Observations: GBIF · Map: CARTO, OpenStreetMap
Sources: fi.wikipedia.org
Identify plants with your phone
Linnea identifies a plant from a photo and tells you its name and its story. Every find takes its own numbered place in your herbarium, with the day and the town where you found it.
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