Flora of North America species comparison

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Astragalus canadensis var. brevidens
Photo is of parent taxon

Canada milk-vetch, Canadian milk-vetch, pasture milkvetch, short tooth milk vetch, short-tooth Canadian milkvetch
Stems

branched, slender, sometimes decumbent and ascending, (10–)15–55(–75) cm.
Leaves

5–15(–23) cm;

leaflets (7–)15–23(or 25), blades (5–)7–30(–40) mm, apex usually apiculate.
Racemes

(2.5–)4–9.5(–15) × 2.5–3.5 cm, flowers (11.7–)12.5–17(–17.5) mm.
Peduncles

stout, (4–)5–15(–20) cm, longer or shorter than leaves.
Pedicels

1.2–3.5(–4) mm.
Flowers

calyx (6.8–)7.1–10.5(–11) mm, lobes 1–2.5(–3) mm, adaxial pair nearly always broadly triangular or deltate (and mostly shorter) than the rest;

corolla ochroleucous, stramineous, or greenish white.
Legumes

grooved dorsally, (9–)10–15 × 2.9–4(–4.5) mm, beak 1.5–3 mm, mostly at least moderately strigulose;

septum 1.5–3 mm wide.
Seeds

(17 or)18–25(–28).
Stipules

(3–)4–14 mm, proximalmost ruptured in some very robust specimens.
2n

= 16.

Astragalus canadensis var. brevidens
Phenology Flowering Jun–Sep.
Habitat Moist but often summer-dry bottomlands, ditches, creek banks with willows, lake­shores, sagebrush hillsides, near springs and seeps, alkaline meadows, depressions on rolling plains, rarely on dry sandy or gravelly soils of brushy hills or lava flows, on stiff, often alkaline, alluvial soils of diverse origin, with sagebrush but ascending along water courses into xeric pine forests.
Elevation 400–2500 m. (1300–8200 ft.)
Distribution
from FNA
CA; CO; ID; MT; NV; OR; UT; WA; WY; BC
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

Variety brevidens is the more xeric form of Astragalus canadensis. It is partly sympatric with var. mortonii, but var. mortonii is usually of higher, more mesic, wooded habitats. No single feature distinguishes vars. brevidens and mortonii. In Utah, var. brevidens intergrades with var. canadensis.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Source FNA vol. 11.
Parent taxa Fabaceae > subfam. Faboideae > Astragalus > sect. Uliginosi > Astragalus canadensis
Sibling taxa
A. canadensis var. canadensis, A. canadensis var. mortonii
Synonyms A. mortonii, A. brevidens
Name authority (Gandoger) Barneby: Leafl. W. Bot. 4: 238. (1946)
Web links 
Unless otherwise noted, all data comes from the online version of the Flora of North America, who have made most of their content available via a Creative Commons license (CC BY 4.0).



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