Common Name: LEGUME FAMILY
Habit: Annual to tree. Leaf: generally alternate, generally compound, generally stipuled, generally entire, pinnately veined Inflorescence: generally raceme, spike, umbel or head; or flowers 1--few in axils. Flower: generally bisexual, generally bilateral; hypanthium 0 or flat to tubular; sepals generally 5, generally fused; petals generally 5, free, fused, or lower 2 +- united into keel (see 3, Key to Groups, for banner, wings); stamens 10 or many (or [1], 5, 6, 7, 9), free or fused or 10 with 9 filaments at least partly fused, 1 (uppermost) free; pistil 1, ovary superior, generally 1-chambered, ovules 1--many, style, stigma 1. Fruit: legume, including a stalk-like base (above receptacle) or not. Seed: 1--many, often +- reniform, generally hard, smooth.
Genera In Family: +- 730 genera, 19400 species: worldwide; with grasses, requisite in agriculture, most natural ecosystems. Many cultivated, most importantly Arachis, peanut; Glycine, soybean; Phaseolus, beans; Medicago, alfalfa; Trifolium, clovers; many orns. Note: Unless stated otherwise, fruit length including stalk-like base, number of 2° leaflets is per 1° leaflet. Upper suture of fruit adaxial, lower abaxial. Anthyllis vulneraria L. evidently a waif, a contaminant of legume seed from Europe. Laburnum anagyroides Medik., collected on Mount St. Helena in 1987, may be naturalized. Ceratonia siliqua L., carob tree (Group 2), differs from Gleditsia triacanthos L. in having evergreen (vs deciduous) leaves that are 1-pinnate (vs 1-pinnate on spurs on old stems, 2-pinnate on new stems) with 2--5(8) (vs 7--17) 1° leaflets, commonly cultivated, now naturalized in southern California. Aeschynomene rudis Benth. , Halimodendron halodendron (Pall.) Voss (possibly extirpated), Lens culinaris Medik. are agricultural weeds. Caragana arborescens Lam. only cult. Ononis alopecuroides L. , Sphaerophysa salsula (Pall.) DC. all evidently extirpated. Cercidium moved to Parkinsonia; Chamaecytisus to Cytisus; Psoralidium lanceolatum to Ladeania.
eFlora Treatment Author: Martin F. Wojciechowski, except as noted
Scientific Editor: Martin F. Wojciechowski, Thomas J. Rosatti.
Common Name: DEERVETCH, DEERWEED
Habit: Annual, perennial herb, shrub, unarmed. Leaf: generally odd-1-pinnate (or +- palmately compound, rarely some or most simple); stipules often gland-like, bump-like, or conic, often not apparent; leaflets 3--9, generally irregularly arranged, lowest not stipular in position. Inflorescence: umbel or 1--2-flowered, axillary, generally peduncled, often bracted. Flower: corolla generally yellow (white, pink), fading darker; 9 filaments fused, 1 free. Fruit: dehiscent or not, exserted from calyx or not, ovoid to oblong, +- beaked. Seed: 1--several.
Etymology: (Greek acme, tip, point, apex, probably for the hooked-tipped fruit) Note: Intermediates may be hybrids. Pollen has 4(7) apertures.
eFlora Treatment Author: Luc Brouillet
Habit: Annual, glabrous in age to +- strigose or hairs soft, spreading. Stem: generally prostrate, branched at base, 0.5--3 dm. Leaf: irregularly pinnate; stipules gland-like or +- 0; leaflets generally 4, 4--15 mm, elliptic to obovate; axis flat, +- blade-like. Inflorescence: 1-flowered, peduncle +- 0, +- longer in fruit, bract 0. Flower: calyx 2.5--5 mm, lobes +- 0.8--1.2 × tube, strigose; corolla 5--9 mm, opening or not, yellow, red in age, wings +- <= keel; stigma glabrous. Fruit: dehiscent, erect or spreading, exserted, 10--18 mm, generally 2.2--3 mm wide, oblong, straight, generally flat, +- septate; beak curved, 0.5--1.5 mm. Seed: 3--7. Chromosomes: 2n=12.
