Growing Lucky Clover in your Garden

Growing lucky clover in your garden – or should that be a lucky shamrock?
Let’s first have a go at clearing up the confusion – botanically and historically. Then we can find out which is the best clover to grow – in the lawn, in the kitchen garden, as a houseplant …

The Traditional Background

Saint Patrick is the patron saint of Ireland who was lived and preached there in the early 5th century. Legend tells that the original three leaves of the native clover were used by him to represent the holy trinity. The rare lucky clover meant that St Patrick could refer to this fourth leaf as God’s grace, ie something very special.

There is a different or further legend involving the Druids. They were said to consider the rare four leaved clover as a good luck charm against evil spirits.

And on to the shamrock. This name comes from the Irish word seamróg or seamair óg, which translates as “little clover.” The custom of wearing a shamrock on St Patrick’s Day is relatively recent, dating back to the 17th or possibly 18th century.

A Bit of Botany

All shamrocks are clovers but not all clovers are shamrocks.

No, I’m not trying to confuse you! Try this analogy by thinking back to your schooldays. You were perhaps told that whilst all squares are rectangles, not all rectangles are squares.
Shamrock

A shamrock should only have three leaves. However, many consider that a lucky shamrock can have four or even five leaves, the extra ones being smaller than the ‘official’ three. But whether that then makes it a lucky clover instead is a botanical question!

The name clover may refer to any of 300 species. The botanical name for clover, Trifolium, is one of the obvious ones: ‘tri’ for three and ‘folium’ for leaf.
Botanically speaking growing lucky clover in your garden means growing one of the Trifolium, of which there are some 20 native species in the British Isles. Including –

White clover, Trifolium repens
Red clover, Trifolium pratense
Lesser trefoil, or hop clover, Trifolium dubium

Then there are the clover look-a-likes such as Wood sorel, Oxalis acetosella, which have four petals.

The lucky four leaf clover, Trifolium, is a mutation. But it is possible to find one – Trifolium repens ‘Purpurescens quadrifolium’. An attractive groundcover, I have however found that plants sometimes revert to producing three leaves rather than four.

Growing Lucky Clover in your Garden – which one?

But which one of the Trifoliums is the lucky clover? Lets consider the three main contenders.

Trifolium repens
White clover is an herbaceous perennial, with white flowers. Described as the most important forage crop for farm animals, it is also a familiar flowering plant in domestic lawns.

Trifolium pratense
Red clover is also an herbaceous perennial and forage crop. The pink (rather than red) flower makes it easier to see among grass than white clover, and it is often perceived as more ornamental.

Trifolium dubium
Lesser trefoil, or hop clover is an annual plant germinating in the spring. The weather conditions can affect whether it is growing in time to be picked for St Patricks Day. It has pretty yellow flowers

However, there is, it seems, some disagreement whether the wild growing Trifolium dubium is the authentic shamrock. Or whether the ‘real’ four leaf clover is the perennial white flowered clover, Trifolium repens.

And to add to the confusion botanists and expert gardeners haven’t been able to agree either. For example, in 1597, John Gerard in his Herbal thought the shamrock was either Trifolium repens or Trifolium pratense.

However in the 1870s, English botanists James Britten and Robert Holland declared that their study showed Trifolium dubium was the one most frequently sold in Covent Garden as a shamrock for St Patrick’s Day.

Later botanical surveys were carried out in Ireland rather than England. In 1893 by an amateur naturalist and then in 1988 by Director of the Irish National Botanic Gardens. The results from both confirmed Trifolium dubium as the clover most recognised and worn by the Irish as the shamrock. In both surveys, about half considered the lesser trefoil as the shamrock, whilst about a third thought white clover was.

Why should we be growing lucky clover in our Gardens – isn’t it a Weed?

For gardeners, a shamrock is a lucky plant to have as it is a member of the leguminous or Fabaceae family. This means that it can help with keeping Nitrogen, one of the three major nutrients, in the soil. Clover and other leguminous plants such as sweet peas and runner beans, have nodules on their roots which contain bacteria. These bacteria have a clever knack of ‘fixing’ the nitrogen in the soil making it easily available and accessible to the surrounding plants.
That said, some of the clover family are ace at populating areas you might not want them to and are frequently perceived as weeds when in the lawn. Which is a pity as they can be controlled by a good mowing regime.

Lawns and Wildflower Meadows

Take a look at your lawn – chances are you’ll find some clover growing in it. Personally, I think having clover and daisies in the lawn is more attractive and beneficial than trying to weed them out. (Or I could just be lazy)
Red clover in particular appears in many of the ‘wildflower’ mixes and will work in a border, a wildflower meadow or merely as an extra plant in your main lawn.

Wildlife Friendly Plants

Clover flowers are sweet with nectar and are much loved by bees and butterflies. Growing lucky clover in your garden encourages these beneficial insects. Clover also makes one of the more readily available honeys, with a light floral taste.

Edible Flowers

All three of the above clovers are edible. But if you want to eat the clover flowers raw or make herb tea from them, be sure to use totally fresh or fully dried petals. Like many plants all clovers have a nasty and a nice side. Mouldy clover petals were used to develop blood thinning medication…after they’d killed some cows who’d eaten them…

Green manures

If you’re using a green manure as part of your crop rotation system, and have a light soil then use the Trifolium species to add nitrogen. Clovers will grow on other soils but do particularly well on light soils.

Growing Lucky Clover as a Houseplant

Oxalis triangularis subspecies papilionacea is also known as the purple shamrock or purple false shamrock. It’s often grown as a houseplant. And a pretty one too, tolerant of a bit of neglect.
If you prefer to grow it in the garden, it may be a good idea to overwinter at least a piece of your purple shamrock in the greenhouse or indoors. It isn’t reliably hardy across the UK.

Growing Lucky Clover in your Garden

We seem to have found both our shamrock and our lucky four leaf clover. And decided that they are not necessarily one and the same. But also that they are one of those ‘good’ plants to have in the garden. And if it happens to be a Trifolium repens with purple foliage that smiles at you from your border rather than a Trifolium dubium there’s nothing wrong with that. Just don’t get confused and wave it around on March 17th 😊

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