FAMILIES OF PLANTS 
79 
PEA EAMILY (EABACEAE OR LEGUMINOSAE) 
The pea family is a large and important family. It contains not 
only all of the different kinds of peas, beans, clovers, and peanuts 
but many other flowering plants and some trees and shrubs. The 
members of the family can usually be recognized quite readily by 
the flowers which are of the sweetpea type. The corolla has 5 
petals and is very irregular. The uppermost petal is larger than the 
others and is called the standard. The 2 lateral ones are called the 
wings, and the 2 lower ones are united along their edges to form the 
keel, which usually encloses the stamens and pistil. There are usually 
10 stamens, 9 of them united and 1 separate. The fruit is a dry pod. 
1. Stamens distinct. Goldenpea {Thermopsis imontana) _(p, 79) 
1. Some of the stamens, usually 9, united. 2. 
2. Leaflets 3. 3. 
2. Leaflets more than 3. 4. 
3. Flowers in racemes. Sweetclover {Melilotus) ___(p. 79) 
3. Flowers in heads. Clover ( Trifolium) _ (p. 79) 
4. Leaves palmate. Lupine (Lupinus) _______(p. 80) 
4. Leaves pinnate. 5. 
5. Leaves with tendrils at the end. Vetch {Vida) _(p. 80) 
5. Leaves without tendrils. 6. 
6. Pods composed of separable, roundish joints united in the middle. Sweet- 
vetch ( Hedysarum )_____(p. 80) 
6. Pods not composed of separable joints. 7. 
7. Pods covered with hooked prickles. Glycyrrhiza lepidota ___(p. 80) 
7. Pods without prickles. 8. 
8. Keel of corolla blunt. Milkvetch ( Astragalus )_____ (p. 80) 
8. Keel of corolla pointed. Pointvetch ( Aragallus )_ (p. 82) 
Goldenpea ( Thermopsis montana) is a stout herb with a cluster 
of nearly unbranched, erect stems which are more or less silky-hairy 
and 1 or 2 feet high. The alternate leaves are compound with 3 entire 
leaflets, and the yellow flowers are borne in a spike, 2 to 5 inches 
long, and are quite showy. 
Yellow sweetclover ( Melilotus officinalis) grows 3 to 6 feet high and 
has small yellow flowers and little wrinkled pods. 
White sweetclover ( Melilotus alba) is similar except that the flow¬ 
ers are white. Both plants came from Europe and both are valuable 
honey plants in some places. The white one, especially, is often 
grown as a forage crop. 
Trifolium rydbergii.— This is perhaps the most common clover in 
the park. The stems grow 4 to 16 inches high, and the flowers are 
yellowish or nearly white and often tinged with purple. 
White clover ( Trifolium reyens) , Red clover ( Trifolium pratense ), 
and Alsike clover ( Trifolium hybridum) are common clovers of the 
East which are occasionally found in the park. Trifolium brcmdegei , 
T. haydenii , and T. montanense have also been reported in the park. 
