Flora of North America species comparison

suffrutescent basally, erect, 60–200(–300) cm, moderately to densely strigose to sericeous or glabrescent.

erect, ascending, spreading, decumbent, or prostrate, glabrous or pubescent.

3-foliolate;

stipules sometimes absent, linear, 1–3 mm;

leaflet blades broadly obovate to elliptic, elliptic-obovate, or spatulate-obovate, 20–50(–75) mm, length 1.5–2.5 times width, surfaces strigillose abaxially, glabrous adaxially.

alternate, palmately compound or unifoliolate;

stipules present or absent, usually persistent, filiform to foliaceous;

petiolate or subsessile;

leaflets 1 or 3[–7], stipels absent, blades 5–150 mm, margins entire, surfaces glabrous or pubescent.

(8–)12–45-flowered, terminal, 10–30 cm;

bracts caducous, filiform.

(1 or)2–50-flowered, usually terminal or subterminal, leaf-opposed, rarely axillary, racemes [heads or flowers solitary or fascicled];

bracts present, persistent or caducous;

bracteoles present, paired proximal to calyx.

calyx broadly cylindrical, sometimes basally truncate, not deflexed against pedicels, 3–4 mm, lobes triangular-lanceolate, sparsely to densely strigose;

corolla yellow to orangish, banner and keel strongly red- to reddish brown-lined, 11–15 mm.

papilionaceous;

calyx usually cylindrical, rarely campanulate or cupulate, lobes 5;

corolla usually yellow, sometimes orangish, rarely white, blue, or lavender, glabrous or hairy outside;

stamens 10, monadelphous;

anthers alternately basifixed on long filaments and dorsifixed on small filaments, dehiscing longitudinally;

style with 1 or 2 lines of hairs adaxially;

stigma terminal, usually bilobed.

legumes, subsessile to long-stipitate, usually inflated, globose, ovoid to ellipsoid, or cylindrical, dehiscent, often tardily so, glabrous or pubescent.

brown, slightly to conspicuously curved, 30–45 × 5–6 mm, minutely puberulent to glabrate, hairs ascending.

1–70, oblique-cordiform to oblong-reniform;

hilar sinus obvious, aril sometimes conspicuous.

= 7, 8.

= 16.