Meliotus indicus
Family: Fabaceae
Description: Annual to 40 cm or higher with upright stems. Leaves trifoliate with leaflets 10-20 mm long. Flowers in spikelike racemes, the upper petals 2-3 mm long, yellow.
Field Identification: Leaf edges are sharply dentate. The leaves have a sweet, cloying scent when crushed.
Plant Trivia: Thisis an invasive species in the United States, mostly in all border states.
Occurrence: Common in wase places and along roadsIt is native to northern Africa, Europe and Asia, but naturalized throughout much of the rest of the world’s temperate climate zones.
Bloom Period: Mar-Apr
Plant Use: Used as a source of nectar for bees, as forage, and as a soil improver through its nitrogen fixing properties. As a salt tolerant species, it is a particularly useful forage crop where other legumes cannot grow. Melilotus indicus has been used as a traditional medicine for its analgesic, antioxidant, aperitive, emollient, and anti-inflammatory properties. It is typical of plants in the Melilotus genus, containing coumarins, compounds with anticoagulant properties. This species has attractive flowers, the flowers and their seeds may be visited by hummingbirds and/or small mammals including rodents and granivorous birds in search of nectar or food and may be visited by butterflies, moths, flies, honeybees, Native Bees and other insects in search of food and nectar.
Dichotomous Key to the Genus Melilotis:
- Flowers white………………………………..M albus
Flowers yellow…………………………….M. indicus
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