Cruciata laevipes

Crosswort
'Cruciata laevipes Opiz'
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Plantae
(unranked):	Angiosperms
(unranked):	Eudicots
(unranked):	Asteridae
Order:	Gentianales
Family:	Rubiaceae
Genus:	Cruciata L.

Cruciata laevipes Opiz 1852, the Crosswort or in Gaelic Luc na croise, is an indigenous member of the madder and bedstraw group of plants. It is also known as Smooth Bedstraw.^[1]

Synonyms

Synonyms - Galium cruciata (L.) Scop. and Cruciata chersonensis (Willd.) Ehrend.

Distribution

Crosswort is native to Scotland, England and Wales, but not to Ireland.^[2] In Europe it grows as far East as Siberia.

Habitat

C. laevipes is found in meadows, road verges, riverbanks, scrub and open woodland, generally on well-drained calcareous soils.^[3]

Species characteristics

Crosswort flowers.

The term laevipes refers to the smooth stalk (not hairless).^[4]

This perennial sprawling plant can grow to a height of 15-70cm, spreads by seeds and stolons and has, unusually amongst this group, yellow hermaphrodite flowers. The inner flowers are male and soon fall off, whilst the outer are bisexual and produce the fruit. The flowers smell of honey.^[5] It is arbuscular mycorrhizal in which the fungus penetrates the cortical cells of the roots.^[6]

Of the whorls of four leaves, only two in each group are real leaves, the other two being stipules.^[7]

Traditional uses

C. laevipes is little used today, however it was once recommended as a remedy for rupture, rheumatism and dropsy.^[8] Bald's Leechbook recommended crosswort as a cure for headaches.^[9]

References

1. ^ ITIS Report
2. ^ Ecological Flora of the British Isles
3. ^ The Flora of Derbyshire
4. ^ Botanical epithets
5. ^ Hutchinson, John (1955). British Wild Flowers. Harmondsworth : Penguin. V.1. p. 211.
6. ^ C. laevipes details
7. ^ Hutchinson, John (1955). British Wild Flowers. Harmondsworth : Penguin. V. 1. p. 211.
8. ^ Medicinal plants
9. ^ Robert Lacey and Danny Danziger August:The Year 1000: What Life Was Like at the Turn of the First Millennium Little, Brown, 2000 ISBN 0316511579

External links

• Photograph of C. laevipes
• C. laevipes photographs