8 



mostly 10-15 cm long; racemes closely 15- to 30-flowered but 

 elongating and open in fruit; pedicels 2-5 mm long; flowers 

 spreading to slightly reflexed, white to ochroleucous, about 

 2 cm long; calyx usually blackish-hairy, 8-10 mm long, the 

 narrowly lanceolate lower teeth about 2 mm long; banner 

 erect; wings 2-4 mm longer than the keel; pod erect, with a 

 stout upward-arching stipe about twice as long as the calyx, 

 the body 1.5-2 cm long, cartilaginous, glabrous, slightly 

 mottled, corrugate-wrinkled, oblong-ovoid, inflated and 

 slightly obcompressed, 4-6 mm broad, 6-10 mm thick, with 

 both sutures sulcate, the lower intruded to form a 3/4 

 complete partition. 



3. Diagnostic characters: The following combination of 

 characters separates this from other Montana species of 

 Astragalus (adapted from Dorn 1984): 



-Leaflets more than 5, not awl shaped 



-Hairs attached at their base 



-Stipules not united on side of stem opposite the petiole 



-Pods stipitate, glabrous, obcompressed with the lower 



suture nearly forming a partition within the fruit, 7- 

 20 mm wide, less than 3 times as long as wide 



-Calyx 8-12.5 mm long, banner more than 15 mm long 



B. PRESENT LEGAL AND OTHER STATUS 



1. Federal 



a. Bureau of Land Management: Astragalus scaphoides is 



included on the BLM ' s list of proposed Sensitive 

 species for Montana (USDI Bureau of Land Management 

 1993) . 



b. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service: 3C (UDSI Fish and 



Wildlife Service 1993); This signifies that the species 

 has "proven to be more abundant or widespread than 

 previously believed and/or ....( is ) not subject to any 

 identifiable threat." 



b. U.S. Forest Service: none; However, Sensitive status 



has been recommended because the species was found for 

 the first time in a National Forest on the Beaverhead 

 in 1994 (Vanderhorst 1995a). 



2. State: The Montana Natural Heritage Program ranks the 

 species G3S1 (Heidel 1994). The global ranking (G3) is a 

 reflection of vulnerability due to a restricted range. 

 Within Montana, the species is considered critically 

 imperiled due to extreme rarity (SI). 



