Trifolium Pratense

Biker Bear's challenge for Flower Friday today is ‘Three’

A fairly common flower growing on verges is the Red Clover (Trifolium Pratense)  It takes its latin name from ‘tres’ or three and ‘folium’ leaf, hence trefoil and ‘pratensel’ referring to the meadow habitat.  Many insects are attracted to the red clover particularly butterflies and bees and it is sometimes called ‘Bee Bread’ because of its importance to bumblebees.  As it is valued for its nitrogen fixation, which increases soil fertility it is used as a green manure crop and so widely grown as a fodder crop.
Christians believed the three-leaf clover was a symbol of the Trinity, so often they were carved inside churches. Among ancient folklore it was believed that if a 3 leaved clover was carried it would be possible to detect witches, sorcerers and fairies. A 4 leaf Clover is even more powerful than a 3 leaf clover and if a 5 leaf Clover was worn by witches they would be more powerful!

When I was a child we used to search for red or white clovers with four leaves but we didn’t think about witches and just treasured our ‘lucky’ clovers.   Perhaps I should have searched today and found one to put an end to eight days without any sun and a maximum temperature of 10.6c in the garden today.  (Confirmed by my three thermometers)