58 
The Ohio Naturalist. 
[Vol. XIII, No. 3, 
Key to the Species. 
1. With leafy aerial stems; flowers axillary. 2. 
1. Stems geophilous, sometimes stoloniferous; flowers appearing scapose.9 
2. Stipules entire; style capitate, beakless, bearded at the summit; 
flowers yellow or white with purple veins. 3. 
2. Stipules sharply dentate, serrate or lacinate, much smaller than the 
leaf-blade; style, slender; flowers cream-colored, white, blue or 
purple; spur at least twice as long as wide. 6. 
2. Stipules deeply divided, leaf-like, nearly as large as blade; style much 
enlarged upward into a globose hollow summit; annual or 
biannual. 8. 
3. Flowers yellow. 4. 
3. Flowers white with purple veins; leaves cordate-ovate, long pointed; 
plants tall. V. canadensis (1) 
4. Leaves more or less hastate, those of the stem usually near the tip; 
flowers yellow. V. hastata (4). 
4. Leaves not hastate; borne along whole length of the stem. 5. 
5. Plant pubescent or villous. V. pubescens (3). 
5. Plant glabrate or sparsely pubescent. V. scabriuscula (2). 
6. Spur about half the length of petals or less; flowers white, cream- 
colored, pale blue or violet. 7. 
6. Spur as long as petals or longer, slender; flowers pale violet veined 
with purple. V. rostrata (7). 
7. Stipules very large, more or less lacinate, 34~1 in. long; petals white or 
cream-colored, with purple veins. V. striata (5). 
7. Stipules small, dentate or serrate, in. long; flowers light blue or 
purple. V. labridorica (6). 
8. Flowers k£-l in. broad, variously colored with yellow, white and 
purple; plants rather robust and spreading. V. tricolor (9). 
8. Flowers } / i~l / 2 in. broad, bluish white to cream-colored; plants tall 
and slender. V. rafinesquii (8). 
9. Style ending in a small hook pointing downward, not plug shaped or 
capitate; flowers deep violet purple (sometimes white), fragrant; 
introduced species. V. odorata (10). 
9. Style club shaped, capitate, or dilated upward, beakless or with a 
conical beak on the lower side; native species. 10. 
10. Leaves merely crenate or dentate or incised at the base, not lobed. 11. 
10. Leaves mostly lobed or parted; in ours, flowers blue or violet. 21. 
11. Flowers yellow or white; plants stoloniferous. 12. 
11. Flowers blue or violet, plants not stoloniferous. 15. 
12. Flowers yellow; style enlarging upward abruptly, capitate, beakless. 
V. rotundifolia (11). 
12. Flowers white, stigma with a conical beak. 13. 
13. Leaves cordate-ovate to orbicular. 14. 
13. Leaves lanceolate to linear-lanceolate. V. lanceolata (14). 
14. Upper and lateral petals three times as long as broad; petioles usually 
red-spotted. V. lecontiana. 
14. Upper and lateral petals twice as long as broad; petioles not spotted. 
V. blatida (13). 
15. Leaves of the cordate type, sometimes more or less ovate or 
reniform. 16. 
15. Leaves of the ovate lanceolate, ovate or sagittate type, sometimes 
incised at the base. 19. 
16. Plants essentially glabrous. 17. 
16. Plants more or less pubescent. 18. 
17. Leaves cordate-ovate, attentuate at the apex, very thin. V. obliqua (15) 
17. Leaves ovate to reniform, obtuse or merely acute at the apex, thick. 
V. papilionaceae (16) 
