bird's-foot

British  

noun

1. a European leguminous plant, Ornithopus perpusillus , with small red-veined white flowers and curved pods resembling a bird's claws

2. any of various other plants whose flowers, leaves, or pods resemble a bird's foot or claw

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Example Sentences

Heading back toward Broadway, we came upon a giant mural on the side of an apartment building featuring male and female hooded warblers perched on a bird’s-foot violet plant.

From Washington Post • Jul. 7, 2022

By varying the steepness of the table, they created miniature mountain streams disgorging into fan-shaped flood plains and bird's-foot deltas.

From Science Magazine • May 13, 2021

The bird's-foot lotus is the picture to me of sunshine and summer, and of that summer in the heart which is known only in youth, and then not alone.

From The Open Air by Jefferies, Richard

The common mallow, whose flower is usually a light mauve, has here a deep, almost purple bloom; the bird's-foot lotus is a deep orange.

From The Open Air by Jefferies, Richard

All the way there and back the sward was short and soft, almost like that of the Downs which they could see, and dotted with bird’s-foot lotus, over whose yellow flowers they raced.

From Bevis The Story of a Boy by Jefferies, Richard