Lucerne - Medicago sativa subsp. sativa

Medium to tall, hairy plant erect to spreading. Flowers blue-violet 7 to 11 mm, in rather short racemes.   Pod spiralled.

There are several other subspecies of Medicago sativa, which may have different colour flowers (white, green, purple, yellow, blackish) and slight differences in the fruits. 

According to Stace (4th edition), the fruit is spiralled in 2-3 (4) compete turns, more or less closed in the centre

A good photo showing the plant with flowers and leaves is needed.

Waysides - and often in and around the margins of fields where the crop has been grown previously and has persisted.

June and July.

Perennial widely cultivated as Alfalfa - Many records probably relate to remnants and escapes from previous crops.

Most records come from Central and Southern England, scarce in North Western Britain.

Fairly frequent in Leicestershire and Rutland, sometimes residual from crops and persisting. In the 1979 Flora survey of Leicestershire it was found in 55 of the 617 tetrads.