FULSE FAMILY. Leguminosw. 



PULSE FAMILY. Legimiinosce. 



A very large family of food-producing plants, with 



butterfly like flowers, and alternate, usually compound 



leaves, generally without teeth. The flowers are perfect 



and are borne singly or in spikes ; they are fertilized 



largely by bees and butterflies. 



„,..^, ^. A smooth and slender plant with deep 



Wild Indigo i^ • 1 1 i? 1 , J 



Baptisin gray-green, triple leaves of wedge-shaped 



tinctoria leaflets Covered with a slight bloom ; they 



Yellow are almost stemless. The small pealike 



June-August blossoms are pure yellow, and terminate 

 the many branches of the upright stem. The flowers 

 are visited by the butterflies and the Syrphid flies, but 

 the honeybee, the leaf-cutter bee Megachile, and the 

 bees of the genus Halictus are probably the most effi- 

 cient agents of cross-fertilization. The plant grows 

 with a bushy luxuriance in favorable situations, and has 

 a most remarkable habit of turning black upon wither- 

 ing. 18-28 inches high. In dry sandy soil everywhere. 

 Not in central N. H. , but common at Nantucket. Found 

 at Pownal, Vt. 



A beautiful, tall, western species, with 

 Blue False , ^i ^ i • i ^ 



Indigo P^^® green smooth stem, light green 



Baptisia wedge-shaped, short-stalked triple leaves, 



aiisti-alis and loose flower-clusters, sometimes 10 



Light violet inches long, of light, dull violet blossoms 



u y quite 1 inch long, of a soft, aesthetic hue. 



The peapodlike fruit is tipped with a spur. Plant 3-6 



feet high. On rich alluvial soil, western Pa., south to 



Ga., and west to Mo. Quite handsome in cultivation. 



The rattlebox, so named because the 



Crotahtria seeds rattle about in the boxlike, inflated, 



sagittalis sepia-black pods, has oval pointed leaves, 



Yellow toothless, and nearly stemless, growing 



June-August alternately along the bending stem. The 



yellow flowers are scarcely ^ inch long. The stems and 



edges of the leaves are soft-hairy. 4-12 inches high. 



In dry sandy soil everywhere, but not very common. 



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