Astragalus tener
Proc. Amer. Acad. Arts 6: 206. 1864.
Plants annual or winter-annual, (2–)6–30(–35) cm, strigulose or glabrate, hairs basifixed; taproot slender. Stems erect or ascending, strigulose or glabrate. Leaves 2–9 cm; stipules 1.5 mm, membranous; leaflets 7–17, blades obovate-cuneate, obcordate to lanceolate, narrowly oblong, or linear-elliptic, 3–16 mm, apex retuse, truncate, obtuse, or acute, surfaces strigulose abaxially, glabrous adaxially. Peduncles erect, incurved-ascending, or divaricate, 2.5–7 cm. Racemes 2–12-flowered, subcapitate, flowers loosely spreading; axis 0.2–0.8 cm in fruit; bracts 0.7–2 mm; bracteoles 0 or 1. Pedicels 0.5–2.3 mm. Flowers 5–11.8 mm; calyx 2.7–5.4 mm, strigulose-villosulous, tube 1.6–3.2 mm, lobes broadly subulate, 0.9–2.3 mm; corolla pink-purple, keel maculate; banner recurved 30–40°; keel 3.4–6.4 mm, apex bluntly deltate, sometimes obscurely beaklike. Legumes ascending, spreading, or declined, stramineous, straight or curved, linear- or narrowly lanceoloid-oblong, obscurely 3-sided compressed, falling before splitting, dehiscent on ground, (6–)10–50 × 1.7–3.5 mm, base round, thinly fleshy becoming stiffly papery, strigulose, villosulous, or glabrous; bearing seeds near middle; stipe 2.7–5 mm. Seeds 5–14.
Distribution
California.
Discussion
Varieties 3 (3 in the flora).
Selected References
None.
Key
| 1 | Flowers 5–6 mm; legumes pubescent; seeds 5–11; coastal from Monterey Bay s to San Diego, California. | Astragalus tener var. titi |
| 1 | Flowers 7.8–11.8 mm; legumes glabrous or pubescent; seeds (10 or)11–14; Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys, San Francisco Bay region, and Salinas Valley, California. | > 2 |
| 2 | Legumes 10–16(–20) mm, straight or incurved, bases round; s Sacramento Valley, n San Joaquin Valley, San Francisco Bay region, and Salinas Valley. | Astragalus tener var. tener |
| 2 | Legumes 27–50 mm, incurved (crescentic), bases tapered; Sacramento Valley, Butte to Solano counties. | Astragalus tener var. ferrisiae |