Oxytropis campestris var. dispar
Oxytropis campestris var. cusickii
field locoweed
Cusick's field crazyweed, Cusick's field locoweed, Cusick's locoweed, Cusick's oxytrope, field locoweed, yellow locoweed
strongly dimorphic, 5–21 cm;
stipules usually concealed by vesture;
leaflets 19–25, scattered or subopposite, blades primary ones crowded, ovate, shorter, distally linear-lanceolate or narrowly oblong, 4–20 mm.
1.2–12 cm;
stipules glabrous or sparsely pilose proximally, margins ciliate or eciliate;
leaflets 7–15(–17), opposite, subopposite, or scattered, blades 4–23 mm.
8–15-flowered, ± open to elongate.
3–15-flowered, subcapitate to somewhat elongate.
7–19(–26) cm, axis 3–8(–11) cm in fruit.
prostrate to erect, 2–19 cm, glabrate, appressed-pilose, or villous-pilose, axis 0.5–3(–6) cm in fruit.
purple, blue, pink, white, yellowish, or polychrome (in populations), 17–19(–21) mm.
whitish or yellowish throughout, keel tip usually not maculate, 14–18(–20) mm.
tube 6–6.5 mm, lobes 2–2.7 mm.
tube 6–9 mm, lobes 1–3.5(–4) mm.
13–18 × 3.5–5 mm.
10–19 × 3.5–5(–6) mm.
= 32.
= 48.
Oxytropis campestris var. dispar
Oxytropis campestris var. cusickii
Variety dispar is closely allied to var. spicata, from which it differs in the flowers being polychrome within populations and in the somewhat firmer texture of the pods. It may well be that var. dispar is the somewhat stabilized product of previous hybridization involving the disjunct pale-flowered var. spicata and the purple-flowered Oxytropis lambertii, common in the same region. However, the presence of var. johannensis, not far distant to the northeast, might account for the occurrence of darker colored flowers in this region.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Variety cusickii is highly variable in flower size, especially where the large-flowered Oxytropis sericea var. speciosa occurs nearby. The existence of apparently transitional populations demonstrates the absence of consistent diagnostic features to separate what are, otherwise, rather distinctive taxa. The flowers seldom fade to a relatively bright yellowish on drying, as in O. sericea var. speciosa. It is not always possible to distinguish specimens of var. cusickii from var. spicata. Those materials traditionally passing as var. cusickii often occur in near proximity to var. spicata, which occurs at lower elevations on the same mountain ranges.
Oxytropis alpicola (Rydberg) M. E. Jones is an illegitimate name that pertains here.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
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