Laminated Specimen - Leaf

Real leaves of Scratchweed - Galium bungei specimen laminated in square plastic sheet. The specimen is clear, transparent and indestructible. Safe, authentic and completely unbreakable product put the Leaf right at your fingertips!

Anyone can safely explore the Leaf from both sides.

Size of the lamination sheet is 7.5x7.5 cm (3.0x3.0 inch).

This is a handmade real specimen craft. Each one will be a bit different (specimen size, color and posture) even in the same production batch.

The pictures in the listing are just for reference as we are selling multiple pieces with same pictures.

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Scratchweed - Galium bungei

Order: Gentianales  Family: Rubiaceae  Tribe: Rubieae  Genus: Galium

Galium is a large genus of annual and perennial herbaceous plants in the family Rubiaceae, with about 400 species occurring in the temperate zones of both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. Most species are known as bedstraw.

Bedstraws are used as food plants by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species.

A straggling, annual plant with a slender TAPROOT and weak square STEMS which clings to other plants (and anything else it contacts, including clothes, pets' fur, etc) with small, curved prickles at the angles of the stems and on the veins and edges of the leaves. Can be found throughout the Northern Hemisphere in moist or grassy places and along river banks. LEAVES linear-lancelolate to 2 inches long and whorled (6 to 8) around the stem. Greenish-white FLOWERS appear on peduncles in small, loose cymes of 2 to 5. FRUITS are small burs covered with hooked bristles, appearing as two joined burs each containing one seed.

Used in Chinese medicine as an anodyne, detoxicant, diuretic, febrifuge and to reduce swellings. Has been used in decoction form for abscesses, boils, cancerous tumors, dysentary, fever, gonorrhea, leucorrhea, and failure to thrive in children.

In China the seeds are dried, then roasted and used as a coffee substitute. Has been cooked like spinach.