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Astragalus deanei

Astragalus deanei (Rydb.) Barneby

Deane's Milkvetch

Fabaceae (Pea family)

Synonym(s):

USDA Symbol: ASDE

USDA Native Status: L48 (N)

"Rather tall and coarse, perennial but sometimes flowering the first year, the stems glabrous, the deep green foliage nearly so, but the leaf-rachis and margins and midrib of the leaflets bearing a few scattered, subappressed hairs up to 0.35-0.5 mm. long, the inflorescence thinly pubescent; stems apparently several, erect or assurgent, (1.5) 3-6 cm. long, simple or nearly so, toward the base striate, hollow, greenish-stramineous or purplish; stipules submembranous, (2) 3.5-7.5 mm. long, decurrent around less than half the stem, the deltoid or broadly triangular-acuminate blades deflexed, glabrous dorsally, ciliate; leaves 8-18 cm. long, the lowest shortly petioled, the rest subsessile, with (19) 21-29 ovate-oblong to lanceolate or lance-elliptic, obtuse or truncate but commonly mucronulate, flat leaflets (0.4) 0.8-2.1 cm. long, the midrib prominent beneath; peduncles erect or incurved-ascending, (6) 12-20 cm. long, as long or longer than the leaf; racemes loosely (13) 18-25-flowered, the flowers spreading or weakly ascending, the axis early elongating, (5) 9-16 cm. long in fruit; bracts membranous, triangular or lanceolate, 1.5-2.5 mm. long; pedicels at anthesis straight, ascending, 0.9-1.2 mm. long, in fruit thickened, spreading widely or slightly recurved, 1.5—3.5 mm. long; bracteoles commonly 2 (0); calyx (4.7) 5-7.2 mm. long, thinly strigulose with mixed black and white or all white hairs, the oblique disc 1—1.6 mm. deep, the submembranous, purplish tube (2.7) 3—4.5 mm. long, (2.5) 2.9—3.8 mm in diameter, the subulate teeth 1.8—2.7 mm. long, the whole becoming papery, ruptured, marcescent; petals apparently whitish, drying ochroleucous; banner recurved through ± 45°, broadly rhombic or rhombic-ovate, shallowly notched, (9.5) 12-15.2 mm. long, (6.2) 8-11 mm. wide; wings (8.7) 10-13.2 mm. long, the claws (3.2) 4-5 mm., the oblanceolate or narrowly obovate, obtuse, slightly incurved blades (6) 6.9-8.8 mm. long, 2.1-3.6 mm. wide; keel (7.8) 8.4-10.5 mm. long, the claws (3.4) 3.8—5 mm., the triangular blades (4.8) 5.1—6.2 mm. long, (2.3) 2.7-3.2 mm. wide, abruptly incurved through 90-95° to the blunt but narrowly deltoid apex; anthers (0.45) 0.5—0.7 mm. long; pod loosely ascending, sessile, obliquely semiovoid-ellipsoid, (1.5) 2—2.8 cm. long, (0.8) 1—1.5 (1.8) cm. in diameter, bladdery-inflated, obconic at base, contracted distally into a broadly deltoid or triangular, slightly incurved, laterally compressed beak 4—6 mm. long, otherwise a trifle obcompressed, openly grooved along the nearly straight ventral suture, the dorsal suture convexly arched, the thin, pale green but purplish- tinged, thinly strigulose valves becoming stramineous, papery, not or very narrowly and obscurely inflexed, the septum when present not over 0.4 mm. wide, the funicular flange 0.7-1 mm. wide; dehiscence apical, through the gaping beak; ovules 29-40; seeds brown or greenish-brown, wrinkled or nearly smooth, dull, 2.5 mm. long." (bibref: 1813).

"The Deane milk-vetch, at first sight a rather nondescript astragalus, is in reality well characterized. Its close relationships lie with A. Palmeri, native to the crest and desert slope of the mountains of southern California and northern Baja California, with widely dispersed A. Douglasii, and with A. oocarpus, the last two found also in San Diego County, but almost always at greater elevations in the interior. Jepson (1936, l.c.) interpreted it as a glabrescent, supposedly white-flowered variety of A. Vaseyi (= our A. Palmeri), but more valuable differential characters are the many leaflets, greatly thickened fruiting pedicels, and longer, better graduated petals. It is true that the detached pod is almost that of the robust northern form of A. Palmeri described as A. Vaseyi var. Johnstonii, but even this differs in the many (mostly 30-40) ovules or seeds. The 10-14 pairs of relatively ample, often visibly penninerved leaflets of A. Deanei are reminiscent of A. oocarpus, but the obliquely ovoid-ellipsoid, readily deciduous pod of more thinly papery texture is diagnostic in this direction. At anthesis both A. oocarpus and A. Douglasii var. Parishii (the form of its species geographically nearest to A. Deanei) can be recognized by the proportion of the shorter, more strongly recurved, and only poorly graduated petals and by the short-toothed calyx silky-ciliate about the mouth.

Little is known about the duration of the average plant of the Dean milk-vetch, but the robust growth of the majority of specimens examined suggests a strong perennial root. The typus was apparently flowering in its first season, as many Inflati are wont to do. It is a depauperate example of its species, with unusually small leaflets, flowers, and fruits." (bibref: 1813).