Plant Database

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Plant Characteristics

Duration: Perennial
Habit: Herb
Leaf Arrangement: Alternate
Fruit Type: Legume
Size Notes: "Decumbent and incurved-ascending stems 1.5-3 dm. long." (bibref: 1813).
Leaf: "Stipules submembranous early becoming pallid and scarious, 2.5-12 mm. long, the lowest broadest and shortest, at least in vernation connate into a subtruncate or bidentate (in age fragile and often ruptured) sheath, the median and upper ones progressively less connate upward, the uppermost free or united by a stipular line, with deltoid or triangular-acuminate, spreading or deflexed blades; leaves (3) 4-12 cm. long, the lowest shortly petioled, the rest subsessile, with (7) 11-19 ovate-oblong, oblong-elliptic, lance-elliptic, or oblanceolate, obtuse (but often mucronulate), those of the lower leaves sometimes emarginate, or (in some upper leaves) linear-elliptic and acute, flat or loosely folded leaflets 0.5-3.2 cm. long." (bibref: 1813).
Flower: "Peduncles 2.5-13 cm. long, erect or (from decumbent stems) vertically ascending or incurved; racemes (15) 25-45-flowered, dense and ovoid to narrowly cylindric in early anthesis, the flowers early nodding more or less retrorsely imbricated, becoming looser (especially at base), the axis elongating, (3) 6-20 cm. longin fruit; bracts membranous, lanceolate, nearly always surpassing the pedicel, deflexed in age; pedicels slender or filiform, straight and ascending or arcuately spreading, at anthesis 1-2.5 mm., in fruit 1.7-3 mm. long; bracteoles 0-2, sometimes conspicuous; calyx 3.5-9.6 mm. long, strigulose with white or some black hairs, the strongly oblique disc 0.6-1.1 mm. deep, the obliquely campanulate, membranous, pallid, purplish, or dark red tube 2.8-3.2 mm. long, 2-2.3 mm. in diameter, either truncate at base and inserted on the pedicel by its ventral corner, or tumid and gibbous-saccate behind the pedicel, the teeth variable, subulate, 0.7-1.6 mm. long, the ventral pair usually shortest, the whole becoming papery, marcescent unruptured; petals dull straw- yellow; banner oblanceolate to oval-obovate, somewhat sigmoidally arched, the blade recurved through about 45 degrees (or in one var. more than 90 degrees), 6.7-17.5 mm. long; wings usually shorter, the blades oblong-oblanceolate, obtuse, truncate, or rarely emarginate, straight or slightly incurved; the keel tipped with sordid lilac, 7-13 mm. long, banner at full anthesis abruptly recurved through about 130 degrees, 6.7-9.2 mm. long, 3.8-4.8 mm. wide; wings slightly longer, the claws 2.7-3.2 mm., the subsymmetrically elliptic and acute or subacute blades 5.9-7.8 mm. long, 1.9-2.8 mm. wide; keel 8-10.3 mm. long, 0.8-2 mm. longer than the banner, the claws 2.7-3.5 mm., the oblong, subtruncate blades 5.6-7.3 mm. long, 2.5-3.2 mm. wide; anthers 0.45-0.6 mm., long." (bibref: 1813).
Fruit: "Pod pendulous, stipitate, the slender, straight stipe 3-3.7 mm. long, the body narrowly ellipsoid, 8-12 mm. long, 2.5-4 mm. in diameter, often strongly decurved, cuspidate at apex, obcompressed, with low-convex dorsal face and filiform dorsal suture, the ventral face flattened and excavated lengthwise along both sides of the elevated and more or less thickened suture as two deep and narrow, or (when fully mature) shallow and open grooves, the thin, green, strigulose valves becoming thinly leathery or papery, stramineous, either nearly smooth, reticulate, not inflexed; ovules 6-8; seeds brown, smooth but dull, 2.5-3.4 mm. long." (bibref: 1813).

Bloom Information

Bloom Color: Yellow
Bloom Time: May , Jun , Jul
Bloom Notes: "Petals dull straw-yellow." (bibref: 1813).

Distribution

USA: NV
Native Distribution: "Locally abundant in scattered stations in the valleys and foothills of eastcentral Nevada (northwestern Nye, White Pine, Eureka, and probably southern Elko Counties)." (bibref: 1813).
Native Habitat: "Barren knolls, gullied hillsides, and desert sinks, in stiff white or red clays derived from limestone, with piñon, juniper, or sagebrush, 5000—7400 feet." (bibref: 1813).

Bibliography

Bibref 1813 - Atlas of North American Astragalus (1964) Barneby, Rupert C.

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Additional resources

USDA: Find Astragalus bisulcatus var. nevadensis in USDA Plants
FNA: Find Astragalus bisulcatus var. nevadensis in the Flora of North America (if available)
Google: Search Google for Astragalus bisulcatus var. nevadensis