Happy St. Patrick's Day

Shamrock

Clover was a "mono culture" back on the farm.  We fed it to the cattle.  I was not taught its connection to the shamrock during that period.

The above plant was photographed at Kingwood Center greenhouse.  It was labeled oxalis rubra as well as Shamrock.  I am unsure whether I realized, even when I made this image, its connection to clover.

Wikipedia relates a history of the understanding of the identity of the the shamrock.  It seems that differing botanists at different times of history have identified different plants as the shamrock.  Two  Irish surveys, one in 1893 and one in 1988 gave similar results as to the Irish perception of the plant as the shamrock.  There were several different plants presented as the shamrock.  They were:  Lesser Clover, White Clover, Red Clover, Black Medick, and Wood Sorrel.  According to the Wikipedia article, the surveys, about 100 years apart, listed the same plants in similar proportions.  The people were asked to send in the shamrock.  The plants submitted are listed, above, in order of decreasing number of submissions.  I have photographed the Lesser Clover, the most common submission, here at Gorman Nature Center and identified it as Least Hop Clover.  

Least Hop Clover

This one grows in my yard, I think.  In the yard it is mowed once a week and thus remains short.  It grows below the level of the grass plants around it.  I never really took time to look at it until I saw it through my camera at Gorman.

When I was in grade school, we thought we knew the shamrock and could draw it!

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