Unidentified Yellow Flower

[welshrich]

Please can anyone help me to identify this flower. It grows in abundance alongside a countryside lane in the Swansea Valley and although I should know what it is, I cannot find it in any online galleries.

[ian_g]

The petals look very similar to Yellow Corydalis but the leaves are definitely not the same so I shall discount that suggestion.

It also looks very similar to Dyer's Greenweed but the flowers aren't in stalked spikes so I think I shall also have to discount that, lol!

Therefore I shall hazard a guess at Common Cow-wheat (Melampyrum pratense) for it seems to fit best with both petal and leaf description.

Don't take my word for it though, wait for an expert (namely Tiggrx) to come along and confirm

Ian G

[Alan]

Hi, Rich, I think your plant could be a type of Cow-wheat - Melampyrum pratense

Alan

[Tiggrx]

I'll agree with everyone else. This is definitely Common Cow-wheat (Melampyrum pratense)

[welshrich]

Thanks all. I also agree with everyone now. I was quite intrigued to read that it is the main food plant of the Heath Fritillary Butterfly and that its secondary food plant is the foxglove which also grows in abundance in the area. Although these butterflies only live in Devon/Kent I thought I may return to the site and look out for any brown and orange butterflies - just in case.

[IanS]

From butterfly conservation:

A naturally scarce butterfly confined to southern England, the Heath Fritillary suffered many extinctions in the twentieth century due to the cessation of coppicing and the coniferisation of deciduous woodlands. Overall it has declined by 92%, and survives in only about 40 colonies.

Protected under the 1981 Wildlife and Countryside Act, the butterfly now survives in Kent, at two woods in Cornwall, on special types of sheltered moorland on Exmoor, and on a few grassland sites in Devon. It has also been reintroduced successfully into two coppiced woods in Essex.