Hooded yellow flowers on a wiry stem; the swollen calyx behind them ripens into a papery pod in which the seeds shake and sound when the plant is moved
Yellow rattle, Rhinanthus minor.
Nature · Wildflowers & flowers
Yellow rattle
Native annual · flowers May–Sep · hay meadows, pastures and dunes
Rhinanthus minor — Orobanchaceae
An annual hemiparasite of hay meadows: it makes its own food by photosynthesis but taps the roots of neighbouring grasses for water and nutrients, weakening them. That thins the sward and lets wildflowers in, which is why conservationists call it the 'meadow maker'. When the seed ripens it rattles in inflated pods, which farmers once took as the signal to cut the hay.
How to spot them
- ▸Erect, slender annual up to about 50 cm, with a stem often marked with dark streaks and few leaves
- ▸Yellow, hooded, two-lipped flowers, with a pair of small violet teeth on the upper lip
- ▸Opposite, lance-shaped, toothed leaves on the stem, roughly veined
- ▸After flowering the calyx swells into a flattened, papery, silvery-green bladder in which the seeds rattle
- ▸Found in unimproved meadows, pastures and dunes on nutrient-poor soil, and used in restoring grassland
How to know it
Conservationists call it the 'meadow maker': it taps the roots of neighbouring grasses, weakening them and making room for wildflowers
Yellow rattle — a hemiparasite on grasses.
Farmers once took the sound of these ripe seeds shaking in their pods as the sign that the hay was ready to cut
Yellow rattle — hence 'hay rattle'.
This annual of unimproved grassland is hemiparasitic: it photosynthesises, but draws water and nutrients from other plants' roots
Yellow rattle. Hemiparasite means partial parasite.
Its genus name means 'nose flower', a reference to the shape of the yellow bloom
Rhinanthus — yellow rattle.
To establish it in a lawn or field, the seed must be sown fresh, on bare soil, by November, because old seed rarely germinates
Yellow rattle — Plantlife's advice.
Cattle love this wildflower, and its leaves can be used to make a yellow dye
Yellow rattle (Plantlife).
Quick-fire facts
- •Family Orobanchaceae (formerly placed in the figwort family, Scrophulariaceae); Rhinanthus means 'nose flower'
- •Plantlife gives a flowering season of May to September and calls it hemi-parasitical on grasses, weakening them and giving other wild flowers a chance to compete
- •Plantlife's 'meadow maker': without it, vigorous grasses grow unchecked and smother the flowers you want; as it grows the grass thins, letting in ox-eye daisy, knapweeds and vetches
- •Life cycle: seeds germinate in early spring; the roots seek out neighbouring grass roots and draw water and nutrients from them; bumblebees pollinate the flowers and the large pods ripen and rattle
- •The seeds are short-lived, so Plantlife advises sowing them as fresh as possible, cut the grass short July to September, expose bare soil, and sow by November
- •The rattling seeds were the farmers' cue to cut hay, and an older saying held that when yellow rattle was in flower the hay was ready
- •Plantlife notes that yellow rattle declined markedly in Britain through the 20th century, probably because of changes in farming practice
- •Meadow loss: an estimated 97% of lowland unimproved grassland in England and Wales was lost between 1930 and 1984 (Fuller 1987, cited by the JNCC); Plantlife repeats that around 97% of the UK's species-rich grassland has been lost since the 1930s, though the JNCC says accurate figures are rarely possible
- •Cattle are fond of it, and the leaves make a yellow dye
Drill it — 8 cards
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Sources
- Plantlife — Yellow Rattle (Rhinanthus minor)
- Plantlife — How to Grow Yellow Rattle
- JNCC — SSSI Guidelines: Chapter 3 Lowland Grasslands