Slender Marsh Bedstraw?

[KeenTeen17]

Is this Slender Marsh Bedstraw? It was very thin and quite small as well. Found growing in wet conditions.

[Hedera]

Could be Galium palustre, but the stems look smoother. The slender one usually is supported by other plants.

[KeenTeen17]

This one was supported by an as of yet small unidentified Rush. I have also seen Fen Bedstraw online but this is a species I'm unfamiliar with. I'm not even sure how you classify a habitat as a fen

[davidbr]

It's definitely not Fen Bedstraw; that has more leaves per whorl.

If I'd found this one myself I'd have probably just put it down as Common Marsh-bedstraw, Galium palustre - but I'm certainly no expert on Galiums

[Greystone]

Hi,

This is almost certainly not slender marsh bedstraw I am sorry to say.

SMB has pinkish flower buds while these look pure white.

I think what you have is Marsh Bedstraw.

To be certain, put the leaf under a magnifying glass - if the hairs on the leaf edge point forward you have SMB. If they point backward toward the base of the leaf, you have Marsh Bedstraw.

You could send a sample to Kew Gardens - they are good with this sort of thing.

SMB is very rare - if you do have it watch out - hoards of officials with clipboards and SSSI's may decend upon you!!

You could get a copy of The Wild Flower Key by Francis Rose - a very handy book for sorting out these issues.

Regards

Greystone

[Rambling Rob]

Hi,
While species Galium spp. are in the air, I would appreciate opinion on this one found back in June on marshes near Sandown, IoW.
It was a very delicate bedstraw, threading through the Juncus for support, and I think you can see pinkish coloration in both the buds and recently opened flowers. A couple of areas of the photo are sampled to show this. The leaves were fewer than in the usual bedstraw whorls.

Thanks,
Rob

[Deer Stalker]

Originally Posted by Rambling Rob

Hi,
While species Galium spp. are in the air, I would appreciate opinion on this one found back in June on marshes near Sandown, IoW.
It was a very delicate bedstraw, threading through the Juncus for support, and I think you can see pinkish coloration in both the buds and recently opened flowers. A couple of areas of the photo are sampled to show this. The leaves were fewer than in the usual bedstraw whorls.

Thanks,
Rob

Marsh Bedstraw has pinkish buds just as they open. In Slender marsh Bedstraw the underside of the petals stay pinkish.
Slender Marsh Bedstraw is locally common in the New Forest but I'm not sure it occurs on the Isle of White.

[Rambling Rob]

Hi Deer Stalker,

I can't find a record for Galium constrictum on the IoW either.

Can you point me to a photo on the web showing the flowers remaining pink? Superficially I can't see much difference between this plant in Sandown and the one you've labelled Galium constrictum in the WAB Image Library.

Thanks,
Rob

[Deer Stalker]

Hi Rob, I cant find any other pics on the web.

Although you can't see it in my pic, the underside of most of the petals were pink.
As Greystone says the other thing to look at is the prickles on the leaves under a hand lens.

[IanS]

As for the question of difference between a marsh and a fen.

Fen is alkaline
Marsh is acid