Seasonal Wild Flowers

Lesser Trefoil

Trifolim dubium

Lesser Yellow Trefoil

Fabiaceae

May to September

It is found throughout the country.

See the BSBI distribution map for Lesser Trefoil

It grows in hay meadows, dry grasslands, bare ground and

waste places.

Lesser Trefoil is a native, nitrogen-fixing, sprawling, winter-

annual herb, growing up to 25cm.

In some habitats it forms a large spreading patch and

in others, such as inlonger grass, it is more erect.

Flowerheads are yellow and small - up to 4mm across.

There are up to 20 flowers per flowerhead.

Fruits (pods) are egg-shaped with a beak.

They are covered with dead flowers when ripe.

Leaves are trefoils and the leaflets are notched.

The terminal leaflet has the longer stalk.

Lesser Trefoil in short grass

Close-up of flowerheads from above

Flowerhead from side

Flowerheads and fruiting-heads

Leaflets of trefoil and stipule

Nitrogen-fixing nodules on roots