It is easy to miss the flowering of field chickweed in spring. The low-growing herbs have small flowers and the blooms appear among many of the more noticeable wildflowers, but we stop to admire the semi-transparent petals, arranged around a flat plane (great for photography).

• Cerastium arvense is a perennial herb in the pinks family that grows from rhizomes or taproots, often forming mats.
• There are no basal leaves and the hairy stems are usually prostate or curved upwards. Lance-shaped leaves on the stems are usually opposite.
• The plant is quite variable but in our area the inflorescence is usually white with 5 petals, each with 2 lobes, and 5 green sepals.
• All photos by the author. Click an image for more information.

• Found in a wide-variety of habitats and elevations.
• Similar to mouse-eared chickweed (cerastium vulgatum), often spotted in disturbed areas and Bering chickweed (cerastium beeringianum) which forms mats on subalpine to alpine dry slopes.
• Seeds form in capsules after flowering.
• Chickweed has sometimes been used as an astringent
• The name “chickweed” comes from a traditional practice of feeding the plant to domestic birds.