Slender milk-vetch

Images

Click on image to view full size

Slender milk-vetch inflorescence

Slender milk-vetch flowers

Slender milk-vetch

Slender milk-vetch

Slender milk-vetch

Slender milk-vetch leaf

Slender milk-vetch

Slender milk-vetch

Slender milk-vetch inflorescence

Morphology

Stem

Erect, ascending, or decumbent, 1 to few, spindly, branched.

Leaves

Alternate, stalked, odd-pinnately compound, 1 to 3 inches long; leaflets 7-21, narrowly linear or linear-oblong, 1/4 to 1 inch long, less than 1/10 inch wide, almost cylindric in cross-section, minutely stiff hairy or glabrous; tips blunt or rounded, notched slightly.

Inflorescence

Racemes, spike-like, on stalks 2 to 8 inches long, 3-50-flowered.

Flower

Calyces bell-shaped; corollas papilionaceous, dark purple to pale pinkish or sometimes whitish with purple keel tips, fade yellowish; stamens 10, 9 united, 1 free.

Fruit

Pods, small, 1-celled, egg-shaped, 1/6 to 1/3 inch long; seeds smooth, brown.

Ecology

Habitat

Open prairie hilltops, wooded or brushy hillsides, ravines, and roadsides.

Distribution

West half of Kansas.

Practical Information

Uses

Lakota mothers would chew the roots of slender milk-vetch to enhance lactation.

Additional Notes