A herbaceous plant with small, lightly perfumed, white or yellow flowers and whorls of slender leaves. It was formerly used for stuffing mattresses.
Genus Galium, family Rubiaceae: several species, including yellow bedstraw (G. verum)
‘Wildflowers: fire pink, several kinds of blue violets, pink and yellow lady's slippers, goldenrod, blue-stem goldenrod, blue asters, and bedstraws.’
‘Magnificent displays of bluebells are out just now and the ground vegetation also has an abundance of foxgloves, heath bedstraw and wood sorrel.’
‘If you flick through the pages of wild flower books you'll see a host of different types of bedstraws, many of which only those armed with a hand lens and a keen eye will be able to differentiate.’
‘Nettles and tangles of bindweed, pelt-snagging goosegrass and bedstraw alike were avoided, while he gazed with pleasure on the eager growth of scattered rowan and hawthorn saplings.’
‘Canada goldenrod and northern bedstraw are among the few wildflowers.’
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