Medicago sativa
Medicago lupulina
alfalfa, lucerne, purple medick
black medic, black medick, hop clover
prostrate to erect.
prostrate, decumbent, or semi-erect.
blades obovate to linear or oblanceolate, 5–35 × 2–15 mm, margins serrate distally.
blades elliptic, ovate, or obovate, 10–20 × 6–15 mm, margins serrate on distal 1/2.
3–30(–50)-flowered, racemes.
(5–)15–50-flowered, cylindrical heads.
5–15 mm;
calyx glabrous or pubescent, hairs eglandular or glandular, lobes equal to tube;
corolla usually purple, yellow, or variegated yellow-violet, rarely violet, green, or white, [yellow-orange, pink], 2 times length of calyx.
2–4 mm;
calyx pubescent, hairs eglandular or glandular, lobes equal to tube;
corolla yellow, 2 times length of calyx.
curved or with 1.5–6 coils, falcate when curved, lenticular, ovoid, or cylindrical when coiled, 7–15 × 1.5–3 mm when falcate, 4–14 × 3–9 mm when coiled, glabrescent or pubescent with eglandular and/or glandular hairs;
face veins (when coiled) oblique from ventral suture, slightly branched, fusing towards dorsal suture.
± ovoid, 2–3.5 × 1 mm, covered with eglandular hairs, sometimes also gland-tipped hairs when young;
face with somewhat fusing, prominent veins sometimes appearing as ridges from ventral suture obliquely to dorsal suture.
2–12, yellow, brownish, greenish yellow, or violet-brown, reniform, 1–2.5 × 1–1.5 mm.
1, yellow to olive green, oval to reniform, 1.5–2 × 1–1.15 mm.
margins entire or basally toothed.
margins entire or irregularly toothed.
= 16, 32.
= 16, 32.
Medicago sativa
Medicago lupulina
Subspecies 6 (3, including 1 hybrid, in the flora).
Medicago sativa is the most widely grown of the temperate forage legumes. Wherever it is cultivated, escapes are likely to be found in the vicinity, and the species has become established in most countries. This polymorphic Old World species is complicated by polyploidy, hybridization, and domestication and has been divided by some (E. Small 2011) into several species (dozens, by some Russian taxonomists) and innumerable infraspecific taxa. The natural habitats of the wild progenitors of M. sativa in Asia (mostly in the former U.S.S.R.) are rapidly being decimated, and there is considerable danger that valuable genetic diversity is being lost.
According to the literature cited below, the three subspecies in the flora region should be expected in all provinces and territories of Canada, and in all states.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Medicago lupulina is valued as a pasture plant (there are several cultivars), cover crop, and as a green manure plant; it is typically plowed under in the fall as part of a crop rotation. Although M. lupulina is often considered a lawn weed, nitrogen fixation associated with this plant contributes to lawn health.
Medicago lupulina is a variable species, but the variation is not structured in ways that can reasonably be classified formally. Of the many criteria that have been used to delimit infraspecific groups, presence of gland-tipped hairs and whether annual/biennial or perennial have been most frequently employed. Density of glandular trichomes is highly variable in the species (L. R. Goertzen and E. Small 1993), and taxa such as M. lupulina var. glandulosa Neilreich have no merit.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
1. Flowers usually purple, sometimes violet, not bicolored, very rarely white; legumes with at least 1.5 coils, usually 2–6. | subsp. sativa |
1. Flowers yellow or variegated yellow-violet, rarely green or violet; legumes falcate or with fewer than 1.5 coils. | → 2 |
2. Flowers yellow; legumes falcate, less than 0.5 coil. | subsp. falcata |
2. Flowers usually variegated yellow-violet, sometimes green, yellow, or violet; legumes with 0.8–1.4 coils. | subsp. × varia |
- Local floras:
BC, 
CA, 
OR, 
WA - Local Web sites: CalFlora, CalPhotos,
Flora NW, 
PNW Herbaria, Turner Photog. 
WildflowerSearch
iNaturalist (observations)
USDA Plants Database- LBJ Wildflower Center
- SEINet
- Plants of the World Online
- Encyclopedia of Life
- Wikipedia
- Google Image Search
- Local floras: BC, CA, OR, WA
- Local Web sites: CalFlora, CalPhotos, Flora NW,
Go Botany, 
IL Wildflowers, 
KS Wildflowers, 
LA Plants, 
MD Biodiversity, 
MI Flora, 
MN Wildflowers, 
MO Plants, PNW Herbaria, 
SW CO Wildflowers, Turner Photog. - WildflowerSearch
- iNaturalist (observations)
- USDA Plants Database
- LBJ Wildflower Center
- SEINet
- Plants of the World Online
- Encyclopedia of Life
- Wikipedia
- Google Image Search
