| Meadowsweet - Filipendula ulmaria
 Meadowsweet - Filipendula ulmaria© Dr Chris Gibson/English NatureMeadowsweet is a large, spreading perennial found growing along streams, ditches, marshes and wet meadows throughout England. In summer, it has a wonderful mass of creamy-white fragrant flowers arranged in dense, foamy clusters above the leaves. The oval, ridged seeds smell rather less pleasant and this has earned it an alternative colloquial - and a little cyncial - name of 'courtship and matrimony'! It has reddish-brown, erect stems and dark green, deeply-veined leaves which are divided into five or six opposite pairs of oval toothed leaflets. This is a very attractive plant for a herbaceous border, bog garden or pond margin. It forms large clumps which can easily be divided. Plant it with other moisture-loving plants such as hemp-agrimony, purple loosestrife, ragged-robin, marsh valerian and common valerian. The closely related species dropwort Filipendula vulgaris prefers drier, limier soils. Other common and older English names for this plant include meadsweet and meadwort. These suggest that the flowers of this plant were once used to flavour alcoholic drinks. AnimalsHelophilus pendulus, Honey bee, Mother of pearl moth, Nephrotoma quadrifaria | Foliage | Green | | Flower | White, January | | Moisture |  (Average) | | Sunlight |   (Full sun to Part-shade) | | Origin | Native |
|
