Astragalus lentiginosus var. micans |
Astragalus lentiginosus var. australis |
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freckled milkvetch, shining freckled milkvetch, shining milk vetch |
freckled milkvetch, southern freckled milkvetch |
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Habit | Plants perennial, clump-forming, 20–40 cm, herbage silvery- or white-silky, hairs 1.1–2 mm. | Plants perennial (short-lived), clump-forming, 25–40(–60) cm. |
Stems | decumbent and ascending. |
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Leaves | 4.5–9.5 cm; leaflets 11–17, blades usually narrowly to broadly obovate or ovate, rarely rhombic-suborbiculate, 5–14 mm, apex truncate-emarginate to subacute. |
(5–)6–17 cm; leaflets (13 or)15–21(or 23), blades usually obovate, broadly elliptic, or rhombic-ovate, rarely suborbiculate, (4–)6–25 mm, apex emarginate or retuse. |
Racemes | loosely (12–)20–35-flowered, lax and open in fruit; axis (3.5–)4.5–10(–15) cm in fruit. |
loosely (10–)15–33-flowered, lax and open in fruit; axis (3.5–)4–12 cm in fruit. |
Peduncles | 4.5–9 cm. |
3–7(–9) cm. |
Flowers | 12.2–14.3 mm; calyx 6–7.6 mm, tube 4.5–4.9 mm, lobes 1.4–2.6 mm; corolla pink-lavender. |
(13.2–)14.5–18 mm; calyx (5.3–)6.4–10.8 mm, tube (4.5–)4.8–7 mm, lobes (0.8–)1.6–3.8 mm; corolla pink-purple, sometimes pale. |
Legumes | green, unmottled, obliquely ovoid, inflated, 15–20 × 8–10 mm, bilocular, stiffly papery, densely silky-villous-tomentulose; beak 2.5–4 mm, unilocular. |
green or faintly mottled becoming stramineous or purplish, narrowly to broadly ovoid-acuminate or broadly lanceoloid-acuminate, slightly or greatly inflated, 12–22 × (4–)5–13(–15) mm, bilocular, thinly papery, usually glabrous, rarely sparsely pubescent; beak 4–8 mm, unilocular. |
Seeds | 23–28. |
18–22. |
2n | = 22. |
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Astragalus lentiginosus var. micans |
Astragalus lentiginosus var. australis |
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Phenology | Flowering Apr–Jun. | Flowering Feb–May. |
Habitat | Forming large clumps over low slopes of mobile dunes. | Open desert, sandy playas and outwash fans, plains, washes in foothills of desert mountains, with Larrea, Carnegiea gigantea, in yucca-grasslands. |
Elevation | 900–1000 m. (3000–3300 ft.) | 600–1300 m. (2000–4300 ft.) |
Distribution |
CA; NV |
AZ; NM; TX; Mexico (Chihuahua, Sonora) |
Discussion | Variety micans is a local adjunct of the variable var. variabilis (D. Isely 1998), restricted to the southern end of Eureka Valley in Inyo County, California, and adjacent to Big Dune and in the Amargosa Desert, near Lathrop Wells in Nye County, Nevada. Isely questioned its recognition at varietal rank, initially considering it a local dune-specialized ecotype. Although it is ordinarily a strong perennial, some plants are evidently short-lived, a feature shared with var. coulteri. Variety micans is in the Center for Plant Conservation’s National Collection of Endangered Plants. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Variety australis is common and abundant in southeastern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico, grading into var. yuccanus to the north in Arizona. Eastward it extends to far western trans-Pecos Texas and becomes similar to var. diphysus. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Source | FNA vol. 11. | FNA vol. 11. |
Parent taxa | ||
Sibling taxa | ||
Name authority | Barneby: Leafl. W. Bot. 8: 22. (1956) | Barneby: Leafl. W. Bot. 4: 117, plate 3, figs. 15–19. (1945) |
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