Acmispon mearnsii

Kearney and Peebles 1969, McDougall 1973

Duration: Perennial Nativity: Native Lifeform: Forb/Herb General: Herbaceous perennials, 10-25 cm tall, stems leafy, decumbent to prostrate, sometimes ascending, herbage silvery pubescent to strigose, plants herbaceous to suffrutescent above the caudex. Leaves: Alternate, pinnately compound, leaflets 3-5, obovate to oblanceolate, to 15 mm long and 3-6 mm wide, obtuse at the tips, sometimes with a notch at the apex (emarginate), margins entire, stipules glandlike or absent. Flowers: Yellow, often drying purple, with banner, wing, and keel petals (papilionaceous), 12-18 mm long, calyx teeth shorter than the tube, stamens 10, flowers axillary, solitary, or in umbel-like clusters, the peduncles usually much longer than the leaves. Fruits: Pods narrow, terete to flattened, 15-25 mm long, 4-5 mm wide. Seeds several. Ecology: Found on dry mesas, slopes, and grasslands, from 3,000-7,000 ft (914-2134 m); flowering March-August. Distribution: Arizona only. Notes: Look to the silvery-pubescent or strigose herbage and the pods 4-5 mm wide to help identify this species. Ethnobotany: Species used for food. Etymology: Acmispon comes from the Greek acme for point or hook, while mearnsii is named after Army surgeon and naturalist Edgar Alexander Mearns (1856-1916). Synonyms: Lotus mearnsii, Anisolotus mearnsii, Hosackia mearnsii Editor: LCrumbacher 2012