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smooth yellow vetch, yellow vetch

Habit Herbs annual.
Stems

erect, sprawling, or climbing, slender to robust, 2–6 dm.

Leaves

2–6 cm;

tendrils simple or branched;

stipules foliose, approaching leaflets in size, semisagittate, with nectariferous patch abaxially;

leaflets 6–16, blades oblong to lanceolate-linear, 8–20 × 1–5 mm, apex obtuse to truncate-emarginate, abaxial surface sparsely pubescent, hairs long, pustulose-based, adaxial glabrous.

Inflorescences

1–3-flowered, 0 cm.

Flowers

18–25 mm;

calyx base symmetric, lobes unequal, abaxial lobe subequal to tube;

corolla pale to bright yellow, banner stenonychioid, blade much longer than claw, glabrous;

style compressed abaxially, pubescent apically, tufted abaxially.

Legumes

reddish black, elliptic, 25–35 × 7–14 mm, oblique-tipped, pilose, hairs tuberculate-based;

stipe to 3–4 mm.

Seeds

3–9, blackish and ± mottled, or velvety to entirely black, compressed-globose, 3 mm diam.;

hilum whitish, linear, encircling 1/6–1/5 circumference of seed.

2n

= 14.

Vicia lutea

Phenology Flowering Apr–May.
Habitat Roadsides, fields.
Elevation 0–500 m. (0–1600 ft.)
Distribution
from FNA
AL; CA; FL; LA; NC; OR; TX; c Europe; s Europe; w Asia; n Africa [Introduced in North America]
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
Source FNA vol. 11.
Parent taxa Fabaceae > subfam. Faboideae > Vicia
Sibling taxa
V. acutifolia, V. americana, V. benghalensis, V. caroliniana, V. cracca, V. disperma, V. faba, V. floridana, V. grandiflora, V. hassei, V. hirsuta, V. lathyroides, V. leucophaea, V. ludoviciana, V. minutiflora, V. narbonensis, V. nigricans, V. ocalensis, V. pannonica, V. pulchella, V. sativa, V. sepium, V. tetrasperma, V. villosa
Name authority Linnaeus: Sp. Pl. 2: 736. (1753)
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