Plant Database

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Plant Characteristics

Duration: Perennial
Habit: Herb
Leaf Arrangement: Alternate
Fruit Type: Legume
Size Notes: "Stems commonly reduced to crowns and all internodes concealed by imbricated stipules, sometimes a little developed and up to 3 cm. long." (bibref: 1814).
Leaf: "Stipules submembranous, or pallid and rather firm, becoming papery and brownish in age, acutely ovate, triangular, or lanceolate, 3-7 mm. long, decurrent around 1/2-? the stem, dorsally pubescent with white or mixed black and white hairs; leaves (1.5) 2.5-10 cm. long, with petiole mostly as long as the rachis, and 7-13 (or in some early leaves 1-3) obovate-cuneate or elliptic-oblanceolate, obtuse or subacute, flat or loosely folded leaflets 3-12 mm. long." (bibref: 1814).
Flower: "Peduncles subradical, 0.5-3 (5) cm. long, much shorter than the leaves, ascending at anthesis, arcuate-procumbent in fruit; racemes shortly but loosely, sometimes subcapitately 5-10-flowered, the axis 5-15 mm. long in fruit 2.2-3.5 mm. long; bracts rather firmly membranous, becoming papery, ovate or lance-acuminate, 1.5-5.5 mm. long; pedicels ascending or a trifle arched outward, at anthesis slender 1.8-2.8 mm., scarcely thickened in fruit; bracteoles 0, rarely 2, exceptionally conspicuous; calyx 6-10.5 mm. long, white- or partly black-pubescent, the subsymmetric, campanulate or turbinate disc (0.8) 1-1.4 mm. deep, the tube usually exactly cylindric, the subulate teeth 1.3-2.5 mm. long; petals commonly purplish, all but the keel-tip often drying ochroleucous; banner recurved through about 40 degrees, broadly rhombic- or spatulate-oblanceolate, shallowly notched, 11-18.5 mm. long, 5.5-8 mm. wide; wings (13) 14.5-18.2 mm. long, the claws 6.9-9.3 mm., the narrowly lance- oblong or oblanceolate, obtuse or erose-emarginate, nearly straight blades 6-9.3 mm. long, 1.7-2.6 mm. wide; keel 11.5-14.3 mm. long,the claws 7.38.9 mm. long; the half-obovate blades 3.7-6.2 mm. long, 2-3.2 mm. wide, rather abruptly incurved through 85-95 degrees to the bluntly deltoid apex; anthers (0.55) 0.6-0.8 mm. long." (bibref: 1814).
Fruit: "Pod ascending (humistrate), varying from plumply half- ovoid, with straight ventral and strongly convex dorsal sutures, to lunately ellipsoid with concave ventral suture, and from nearly as broad to less than half as broad as long, 9-20 (22) mm. long, 4-8 mm. in diameter, obcompressed toward the base, passing upward into a laterally compressed beak, carinate ventrally by the prominent, thick suture, the fleshy, green or purplish, densely strigulose valves becoming leathery, brownish or stramineous beneath the vesture, nearly smooth or finely rugulose-reticulate, not inflexed; dehiscence apical, after falling; ovules 18-33; seeds brown or soot-black, smooth or variously pitted, 1.7-2.5 mm. long." (bibref: 1814).

Bloom Information

Bloom Color: Yellow , Purple
Bloom Time: May , Jun , Jul
Bloom Notes: "Petals commonly purplish, all but the keel-tip often drying ochroleucous." (bibref: 1814).

Distribution

USA: AZ
Native Distribution: "Rather frequent on the Kaibab and Mogollon Plateaus in Coconino County and extending feebly southeast to the Natanes Plateau in Gila County, Arizona." (bibref: 1814).
Native Habitat: "Gentle slopes and flats in yellow pine forest, descending more rarely into oak woodland in dry stony soils of basaltic or rarely calcareous origin, (5900) 6500-8000 feet." (bibref: 1814).

Bibliography

Bibref 1814 - Atlas of North American Astragalus Volume 2 (1964) Barneby, Rupert C.

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Additional resources

USDA: Find Astragalus castaneiformis in USDA Plants
FNA: Find Astragalus castaneiformis in the Flora of North America (if available)
Google: Search Google for Astragalus castaneiformis