Common Fumitory - Fumaria officinalis

Description

Weak, low to short scrambling plant, leaf segments flat. Racemes longer than their stalks, flowers numerous, purplish-pink with a reddish-black apex. 7 to 9 mm long. Sepal with irregular teeth.

Similar Species

All other Fumaria

Identification difficulty
ID checklist (your specimen should have all of these features)

Most Fumaria in VC55 are likely to be this species. This is very difficult genus that is hard to identify from a photo; determination depends on fine differences in flower, sepal and bract shape and size.  Flowers 5-6mm; sepals 0.5-1mm, narrower than corolla; lower petal spathulate; fruits truncate to retuse at apex and distinctly wider than long.

Stace (4th edition)  says 'it is essential to base determinations on well-grown non-shaded material in early or mid flowering season.  Late or shade-grown plants may be very atypical, with short paler petals, longer narrower sepals, relatively long bracts and less or more recurved fruiting pedicels. . .' Photos must be taken with the above in mind. 

Recording advice

Photos showing details of flower and seed shape

Habitat

A plant of disturbed and bare soil and cultivated land.

When to see it

May to October.

Life History

Annual.

UK Status

Found throughout Britain, often common.

VC55 Status

Fairly frequent in Leicestershire and Rutland. The Flora of Leicestershire published in 1988 states that it occurred in 205 of the 617 tetrads.

Listed as subsp. officinalis in the current Checklist (Jeeves, 2011), and as Alien, Occasional

 

Leicestershire & Rutland Map

MAP KEY:

Yellow squares = NBN records (all known data)
Coloured circles = NatureSpot records: 2020+ | 2015-2019 | pre-2015

UK Map

Species profile

Common names
Common Fumitory
Species group:
Wildflowers
Kingdom:
Plantae
Order:
Ranunculales
Family:
Papaveraceae
Records on NatureSpot:
54
First record:
14/05/2006 (Calow, Graham)
Last record:
18/05/2024 (Pugh, Dylan)

Total records by month

% of records within its species group

10km squares with records

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