Whitlow grass is of course not a grass at all but a very small white crucifer which flowers in the early Spring or late Winter. It is one of those plants you can see on stony ground in the first hunts of the year but which, by May or June has completely disappeared without trace. The rosettes look quite like those of Capsella bursa-pastoris (Shepherd's Purse) but the plant is usually smaller reaching a maximum of 10 cm with flowers only a few millimetres across. As with many crucifers the key to identification lies with the combination of fruit shape, leaf shape and flower. There are sub-species of Erophila which I shall try to find and illustrate when Spring really comes.
By A56 Cheshire, 16th January 2005
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Added on January 16th 2005