Weedy

A gorgeous day here today and after an interesting morning with my Saxlish group (discussing Anglo-Saxon words and language… and lots of other stuff) and after a nice lunch of leftover Turkish salad, we went out into the garden armed with secateurs ready to do batle with the weeds which seem to have taken hold.

I chopped a load of brambles out of the Japonica, and a really horrid sticky weed which apparently is cleavers… I guess to cleave is to hold fast to something and this is what cleavers does. Its actual name is galium aparine, but itis also known as clivers, goosegrass, kisses, stickyweed, stickybud, and sticky willy… It grows really quickly, two months from seed to setting seed. It can over-run everything, and when you try to pull it up, it just breaks off in your hand.

Cleavers can grow practically anywhere all across the world and can be a problem for cereal growers – yes, I can imagine that! It is edible, and used as a vegetable in China, although I can’t imagine who would want to eat it, although circumstances might force people to have to eat it in times of famine, I guess… in which case its quick growth and abundance might be an advantage. The seeds can be roast and ground as a coffee substitute, again in times of great hardship I would guess.

It apparently has medicinal qualities, used as an infusion in traditional remedies, to treat to treat kidney problems, for example, and skin disorders (eczema, psoriasis, and used fresh on wounds andulcers)  high blood pressure; it is mildly laxative a diuretic… it has all sorts of benefits, apparently! In fact it may have been used like this for millennia but actual scientific proof that it really does work hasn’t yet been made.

I have no desire to use it in any way, it’s all gone into the green waste bags to be taken away by our obliging refuse collectors!

As usual, I have looked for other names for it, and what a lot! Here are just a few I discovered:

• • amor de hortelano
  • barweed
  • catchweed,
  • eriffe
  • everlasting friendship
  • gia mara
  • goosebill
  • grateron
  • grip grass
  • hayriffe
  • hayruff
  • hedgeheriff
  • loveman
  • mutton chops
  • robin-run-in-the-grass
  • scratweed