It’s called sticky mouse-ear chickweed

 The woods at Panola Mountain are just turning green. Dogwoods are putting out sprays of white flowers, and the wild azaleas we saw were pink and white. It’s a beautiful time of year in the Piedmont.

On the forest floor were violets, genus Viola, and buttercups, genus Ranunculus.

Among the less showy flowering plants were stands of sticky mouse-ear chickweed, Cerastium glomeratum. These little annuals have white flowers with five petals that are deeply notched at the tip — it almost looks as if there were 10 petals.

The capsules of the sticky mouse-ear chickweed are cylinders, almost like a section of pipe. In common chickweed, Stellaria media, the capsules are shaped like eggs.

These two “chickweeds” are in different genera in the carnation family, Caryophyllaceae. If you’re wondering about the common name, farmers noticed that chickens were fond of the plants.

I saw the sticky mouse-ear chickweed mixed in with a stand of lesser hop trefoil, Trifolium dubium, which might be what you picture when someone mentions Irish shamrocks.