3 



Minnesota Plant Life. 



Rather closely connected with the clovers are the little herbs 

 known as lotuses no relatives, however, of the water-lily 

 lotuses, for this is an instance where common names are con- 

 fusing. In these plants the pods are more elongated. They 

 occur singly and hang down in a limp position when mature, 

 while the flowers are small, rose colored and with darker stand- 

 ard. The leaves are for the most part made up of three leaflets. 

 A lotus may be known by its solitary drooping pods. 



Indian turnips. The pomme de terre, or prairie-turnip, or 

 Indian turnip, is an herb somewhat branched, of robust habit, 

 and arising from a tuberous root. The flowers are in hairy 

 ovoid spikes and the leaves are 

 made up of five radiating leaf- 

 lets. The pod is oblong, 

 smooth and inclosed in the 

 calyx. Two other plants of 

 this genus are abundant in the 

 state. One is conspicuous for 

 its silvery leaves and is known 

 as the silver-leafed prairie- 

 clover. The silvery appear- 

 ance, as in the buffalo-berries, 

 is given by hairs on the sur- 

 face of the leaves. There are 

 from three to five leaflets to 

 each leaf and the flowers are 

 of a blue color, sessile and in small clusters. Another variety, 

 the many-flowered prairie-clover, has leaves similar in form to 

 the silver-leafed variety, but without the hairs which give them 

 the metallic lustre. In this variety there are a number of small 

 blue flowers aggregated in loose racemes. 



Shrubby false indigos. The shrubby false indigos occur in 

 Minnesota in three varieties. These plants are remarkable for 

 the modification of the butterfly-shaped flower, for all of the 

 five petals, except the standard, have disappeared, so that the 

 flower has but one petal. This is of a purplish, violet or blue 

 color. The leaves are pinnate with from twenty to fifty leaflets, 

 arranged opposite each other on their common midrib. The 

 large false indigo is from five to twenty feet in height, with 



FIG. 148. White clover. After photograph 

 bv Williams. 



