Yellow Rattle Seeds - Rhinanthus minor - Wildflower

Also known as Corn Rattle, Hay Rattle and Penny Grass, Yellow Rattle has bright yellow hooded flowers and green slender leaves. When the seeds are ripe, they make a rattling noise in their pods, hence the name.

Yellow Rattle parasitizes the roots of different meadow plants, especially grasses and legumes and is dependent on these plants for certain nutrients. It is grown in meadows to reduce the vigour of grasses and give other wildflowers the chance to flourish. 

It needs exposure to several months of cold before it will germinate so should be sown in the autumn / early winter.  The seedlings will emerge around March time depending on weather conditions.

Yellow Rattle seeds loses viability and does not store well so please so all the seed in the year it is purchased. 

Sow at a rate of 0.1g to 1g per square metre, depending on how quickly you wish to establish a colony. If adding to a mixture which will be sown into bare soil, we recommend sowing at a rate of 0.1 to 0.5 per square metre.

Yellow Rattle provides food for the following creatures: 

• Large Bumblebees
• Grass Rivulet Moth 🐛

All our seed packets include sowing instructions.

Jemima’s Garden seeds are plastic free and reyclable. They’re contained in an inner glassine envelope, (made from pine wood cellulose), and an outer Kraft paper seed packet. Any shipping packaging is also plastic free and recyclable.