Genista tinctoria Dyer's Greenweed C DD N
The poor once collected this plant for selling to the dyers because it could be used create a yellow dye particularly by using the flowers. Together with woad it would also give a green colour to the fabric. Wool was best. As was often the case it was "fixed" with a mordant such as Alum. So well known was this as an useful dyers plant that the first colonisers of North America took some with them to New England where it is now an alien weed.
There are two sub species and this one is the common ssp tinctoria. It grows throughout England and Wales but hardly strays across the border into Scotland. While settlers took it to North America they never bothered taking it across the Irish Sea since it is completely absent from Ireland.
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| Genista tinctoria |
Grassland near Old Colwyn, North Wales 1st July 2008
Added on 4th July 2008, updated 23rd January 2009, updated 2nd April 2010