Onobrychis, the sainfoins, are a genus of Eurasian perennial herbaceous plants of the legume family (Fabaceae). Including doubtfully distinct species and provisionally accepted taxa, about 150 species are presently known. The Flora Europaea lists 23 species of Onobrychis; the main centre of diversity extends from Central Asia to Iran, with 56 species – 27 of which are endemic– in the latter country alone.[1]O. viciifolia is naturalized throughout many countries in Europe and North America grasslands on calcareous soils.
Description, ecology and uses
Sainfoins are mostly subtropical plants, but their range extends throughout Europe as far north as southern Sweden. These plants grow on grassland, agricultural land and wasteland. The leaves are pinnate, alternate, with 6 to 14 pairs of oblong to linear leaflets. Sainfoins have pale pink flowers, typically blooming between June and September and pollinated by honey bees and solitary bees. The rounded single-seeded pods bear prominent spikes or similar protrusions in many species, enabling them to cling to the fur of large mammals and be thus distributed.
These highly nutritious plants were an important forage for heavy working horses in agriculture, and are still an excellent source of nectar for honey production as well as pollen for bee food. Because sainfoins are rich in tannins which protect proteins from hydrolysis in the rumen, the proteins are instead absorbed in the abomasum. Onobrychis typically have a deep taproot and so are very drought resistant, but do not recover well from overgrazing. Adapted to slow but steady growth in the aridsteppe belt of Eurasia, sainfoins are difficult to establish as pasture, are not persistent in grassland, and only yield one crop of hay or seeds per year. Thus they are seldom grown in any significant extent, though O. viciifolia is met with somewhat more regularly.
Sainfoin provides a superb forage for grazing animals and voluntary intake of sainfoin by cattle and sheep is 20% higher than for grass. Unlike many other legumes, it is non-bloating and is known to have anthelmintic properties, so reducing the problems associated with livestock worms. Sainfoin contains condensed tannins, and it is these that protect animals against bloat. Sainfoin has also been shown to increase protein absorption. This, combined with its other health benefits, mean that animals grazing sainfoin have very rapid liveweight gains, so young stock can be finished sooner and with very good carcass grades. Sainfoin is therefore extremely useful to low input and organic farmers. Yields can be very high at around 16t DM per hectare.
Methods and research techniques have been studied and developed to look specifically at Sainfoin polyphenols which include tannins and flavonoids. There are significant differences between Sainfoin types and this will lead to further development of Sainfoin plant breeding.
One method for improving nitrogen utilisation by ruminants and reduce greenhouse gases (CH4, N2O), without altering their nitrogen and energy value, is to use forages that contain condensed tannins, such as sainfoin. The nutritive value of sainfoin, despite its lower nitrogen content than lucerne, is high. Future research, on the nutritional impact of condensed tannins is likely not only be based on condensed tannin content, but also include structure-activity considerations. The results obtained, with sheep at maintenance fed a diet containing only sainfoin will be tested with producing animals, for example growing sheep and cattle, lactating ewes, goats or cows. In producing animals the diet will comprise different forage sources and supplement feeds.
Sainfoin is seldom used as a pure crop and is generally introduced in pasture in a grass-legume mix with cocksfoot (Dactylis), ryegrass (Lolium) or with other legumes such as red clover, white clover or lucerne. Results have shown the choice of the variety is important. A variety like Esparcette, characterised by the highest condensed tannin content, may provide beneficial effects with a lower proportion in a mixture with other legumes. Preserving legumes, as silage, is a good way to provide an on-farm source of home-grown energy and protein, offers advantages over traditional haymaking, being less weather-dependent, and allows a high quality of forage during the harvesting period. In particular, wrapped silage bales of sainfoin have great potential in animal nutrition and can be used by farmers, as found that condensed tannin effects were not reduced by this mode of preservation.
Etymology
Onobrychis means "devoured by donkeys", from Ancient Greekónos (ὄνος, "donkey") and brýkein (βρύκειν, "to eat greedily"). This refers to sainfoin's good properties as a forage plant for large mammalian herbivores.
"The herb is called sain-foin' in France, in Italy herba medica, in Provence and the Languedoc luzerne. From the inordinate praise the plant has been given, for its medical virtues and for fattening the livestock that graze on it, comes the term sain."[2]
In northern European languages that have been less influenced by French, the plants' name usually derives from esparceto, the Provençal term for the similar-looking and closely related sweetvetches (Hedysarum). Examples are Danishesparsette, Dutchesparcette, GermanEsparsette, Lithuanianesparceta, Polishsparceta, Russian 'espartset (Эспарцет) and Swedishesparsett. Meanwhile, the Occitan name of sainfoin, luzerne, has in many languages come to mean species of the related genus Medicago, in particular Alfalfa (M. sativa).
In George Orwell's Coming Up for Air, travelling salesman George Bowling regularly reminisces about the smell of sainfoin in his father's seed shop in Lower Binfield.
List of species
The following species are considered at least provisionally valid by the International Legume Database & Information Service; some notable subspecies are also listed:[3]
Onobrychis chorassanicaBoiss. (= O. circinnatasensu auct. fl. As. Med. non Ledeb., O. radiata sensu auct. fl. As. Med., O. vaginalis sensu auct. fl. As. Med.)
Onobrychis saravschanicaB.Fedtsch. (= O. amoenasensu auct. non Popov & Vved., O. baldshuanicasensu auct. non Sirj., O. baldzuanicaSirj., O. circinatasensu auct. non Ledeb. non fl. As. Med.)
↑ L'herbe appellée en France sain-foin, en Italie herba medica, en Provence et Languedoc luzerne. De l'excessive louange qu'on a donné à ceste plante, à cause de sa vertu medecinale et engraissante le bestail qui s'en paist, vient ce mot de sain.
Onobrychis viciifolia, also known as O. sativa or common sainfoin has been an important forage legume in temperate regions until the 1950s. During the Green Revolution it was replaced by high yielding alfalfa and clover species. Due to its anthelmintic properties the common sainfoin is a natural alternative to drugs to control nematode parasitism in the guts of small ruminants. This is the main reason why O. viciifolia came back to the scientific agenda during the last years.
Medicago is a genus of flowering plants, commonly known as medick or burclover, in the legume family (Fabaceae). It contains at least 87 species and is distributed mainly around the Mediterranean basin. The best-known member of the genus is alfalfa, an important forage crop, and the genus name is based on the Latin name for that plant, medica, from Greek: μηδική (πόα) Median (grass). Most members of the genus are low, creeping herbs, resembling clover, but with burs. However, alfalfa grows to a height of 1 meter, and tree medick is a shrub. Members of the genus are known to produce bioactive compounds such as medicarpin and medicagenic acid. Chromosome numbers in Medicago range from 2n = 14 to 48.
Nonea is a genus of flowering plants in the family Boraginaceae. Sometimes known as monkswort, these are herbaceous perennials or annual plants, native to Europe, Asia and Africa.
Vicia is a genus of over 240 species of flowering plants that are part of the legume family (Fabaceae), and which are commonly known as vetches. Member species are native to Europe, North America, South America, Asia and Africa. Some other genera of their subfamily Faboideae also have names containing "vetch", for example the vetchlings (Lathyrus) or the milk-vetches (Astragalus). The broad bean is sometimes separated in a monotypic genus Faba; although not often used today, it is of historical importance in plant taxonomy as the namesake of the order Fabales, the Fabaceae and the Faboideae. The tribe Vicieae in which the vetches are placed is named after the genus' current name. Among the closest living relatives of vetches are the lentils (Lens) and the true peas (Pisum).
Isatis is a genus of flowering plants in the family Brassicaceae, native to the Mediterranean region east to central Asia. Its genus name, Isatis, derives from the ancient Greek word for the plant, ἰσάτις. The genus includes woad. Due to their extremely variable morphology, the Asian species in particular are difficult to determine; the only reliable diagnostic feature is the ripe fruit. They are (usually) biennial or perennial herbaceous plants, often bluish and hairless or downy hairy with the upright stem branched.
Bupleurum is a large genus of annual or perennial herbs or woody shrubs, with about 190 species, belonging to the family Apiaceae. The full size of its species may vary between a few cm to up to 3 m high. Their compound umbels of small flowers are adorned with bracteoles that are sometimes large and may play a role in attracting pollinators. Rare among the Apiaceae are the simple leaves, bracts, and bracteoles. The genus is almost exclusively native in the Old World Northern Hemisphere, with one species native to North America and one species native to southern Africa.
Hedysarum (sweetvetch) is a genus of the botanical family Fabaceae, consisting of about 200 species of annual or perennial herbs in Asia, Europe, North Africa, and North America.
Condensed tannins are polymers formed by the condensation of flavans. They do not contain sugar residues.
Psephellus is a genus of flowering plants in the family Asteraceae, native to eastern Europe and western Asia. A taxonomic revision reassigned many species from Centaurea to Psephellus.
Haplophyllum is a genus of flowering plants belonging to the family Rutaceae. It is the only genus in the subfamily Haplophylloideae.
References
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Onobrychis.
International Legume Database & Information Service (ILDIS) (2005) Genus Onobrychis. Version 10.01, November 2005. Retrieved 2009-JAN-26.
Muẓaffariyān, Valī Allāh (1996) Farhang-i nāmhā-yi giyāhān-i Īrān: Lātīnī, Inglīsī, Fārsī ["A dictionary of Iranian plant names: Latin, English, Persian"]. Tehran: Farhang-i Muʻāṣir [in Persian with Latin and English names]. ISBN964-5545-19-6
Hayot Carbonero, C., Mueller-Harvey, I., Smith, L., Brown, T. A review of a beneficial forage, Plant Genetic Resources: Utilization and Characterization 2011, 9, 70–85.
Stringano, E., Hayot Carbonero, C., Smith, L.M.J., Brown, R.H., Mueller-Harvey, I. Proanthocyanidin diversity in the EU 'Healthy Hay' sainfoin (Onobrychis viciifolia) germplasm collection Phytochemistry 2012, 77, 197–208.
Niderkorn, V., Mueller-Harvey, I., Le Morvan, A., Aufrère, J. Synergistic effects of mixing cocksfoot and sainfoin on in vitro rumen fermentation. Role of condensed tannins. Anim. Feed Sci. Technol. 2012, 178, 48–56.
Theodoridou, K., Aufrère, J., Andueza, D., Le Morvan, A., Picard, F., Stringano, E., Pourrat, J., Mueller-Harvey, I., Baumont, R. Effect of plant development during first and second growth cycle on chemical composition, condensed tannins and nutritive value of three sainfoin (Onobrychis viciifolia) varieties and Lucerne. Grass For. Sci. 2011, 66, 402–414.
Theodoridou, K., Aufrère, J., Andueza, D., Pourrat, J., Le Morvan, A., Stringano, E., Mueller-Harvey, I., Baumont, R. Effects of condensed tannins in fresh sainfoin (Onobrychis viciifolia) on in vivo and in situ digestion in sheep Anim. Feed Sci. Technol. 2010, 160, 23–38.
Stringano, E., Cramer, R., Hayes, W., Smith, C., Gibson, T., Mueller-Harvey, I. Deciphering the complexity of sainfoin (Onobrychis viciifolia) proanthocyanidins by MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry with a judicious choice of isotope patterns and matrices. Anal. Chem. 2011, 83, 4147–4153.
papers by M. Lorenz and P. Uden (Uppsala University)
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