Galium verum Lady's Bedstraw

A sprawling, more or less hairless, stoloniferous perennial whose small yellow flowers give off a strong, sweet honey-like fragrance in summer. Native plants are usually low-growing or sprawling and occur in well-drained calcareous grasslands such as on chalk or limestone downlands, coastal cliffs, in fixed dunes and open skeletal habitats such as roadsides and railways. It is widespread and common throughout most of Britain but has declined in some areas as a result of the agricultural improvement of grazing land, The native form is almost confined to coastal habitats in West Glamorgan and is a characteristic calcicole of the south Gower coastal cliffs and the dune flora of Gower and Swansea Bay from Blackpill in Swansea to Morfa Dunes in Neath Port Talbot. A much taller and more robust form, up to almost 1m tall, is very common in roadside verges, presumably derived from wild flower seed mixtures and of continental (European) provenance. It is particularly abundant in the roadside verges of Neath Port Tabot between Briton Ferry and Margam often growing with Hedge Bedstraw (Galium album).

Native on coastal sea cliffs and dune grasslands