LEGUMINOSAE. 151 



214. HOSACKIA. 



Herbs or shrubs; leaves pinnate, 1-many-foliolate; stipules 

 minute and gland or spine-like; flowers yellow or reddish, 

 solitary or in umbels ; calyx-teeth nearly equal ; petals free from 

 the diadelphous stamens ; standard ovate or roundish ; pod linear, 

 compressed or somewhat terete, sessile, several-seeded. 



Annuals; flowers solitary. H. americana. 



Perennials; flowers in umbels. 



Foliage glabrous or nearly so; pods linear, glabrous, many- 

 seeded. H. bicolor. 



Foliage pubescent; pods curved, pubescent, 1 or 2-seeded. H. decumbens. 



Hosackia americana (Nutt.) Piper. Annual, erect, usually branched, 30- 

 60 cm. high; leaves 3-foliolate, or the upper 1-foliolate, nearly sessile; leaflets 

 ovate or lanceolate, silky-pubescent, acuminate, stalked, 6-20 mm. long; 

 stipules gland-like, dark; peduncles as long as or longer than the leaves; 

 flowers pink, 4-6 mm. long; calyx villous, the slender lobes twice as long as the 

 tube, nearly equaling the corolla; pod linear, narrow, often reflexed, glabrous 

 and shining, 2-3 cm. long. Sandy soil, common. 



Hosackia americana pilosa (Nutt.) Piper. Similar to the species but the 

 pubescence hirsute and spreading. Gravelly stream banks, rare. 



Hosackia bicolor Dougl. Perennial, glabrous or nearly so throughout, 

 erect or decumbent, 30-50 cm. high, stout; leaflets 5-9, obovate, mostly obtuse, 

 cuneate at base, 1.5-2 cm. long; stipules broad, scarious; peduncles exceeding 

 the leaves; flowers nearly sessile, spreading, 3-7 in an umbel; calyx about 6 mm. 

 long, the teeth shorter than the campanulate tube; corolla yellow, the wings 

 white, 2-2.5 cm. long; pod linear, narrow, glabrous, 4-6 cm. long. Wet 

 places, rare. 



Hosackia decumbens Benth. Perennial, many-stemmed from a thick 

 woody root, villous and more or less tomentose; stems decumbent, branched, 

 30-60 cm. long; leaflets 5-7, oblong to obovate, cuneate at base, mostly acute, 

 6-10 mm. long; stipules minute, spine-like, deciduous; peduncles scarcely 

 longer than the leaves; flowers yellow, in 5-10-flowered umbels, each umbel 

 with a 1-3-foliolate bract; calyx silky, the teeth as long as the tube; pods 

 falcate, pubescent, mostly 2-seeded. Common on the gravelly plains about 

 Spokane. 



215. ASTRAGALUS. 



Chiefly perennial herbs; leaves odd-pinnate, with stipules; 

 flowers in spikes or racemes; calyx with 5 nearly equal teeth; 

 corolla and its slender-clawed petals usually narrow, spreading, 

 equalling or exceeding the wings and blunt-keeled; stamens 

 diadelphous; anthers all alike; ovary sessile or stipitate; ovules 

 numerous; pod sometimes inflated, 1-celled or 2-celled by a false 

 partition; seeds few or many. 



Pods membranaceous, thin, much inflated. 



Herbage slightly pubescent; pods 2-celled. A. lentiginosus. 



Herbage silky or villous; pods 1-celled. A. hookerianus. 



Pod coriaceous or chartaceous, not inflated. 



Herbage white-woolly or hairy. 



