Herbs, biennial, 20-40 cm tall, with taproot. Stems erect, hollow, narrowly winged-ridged, leafy and branched throughout, especially above. Petiole 3-7 cm, long and rather broadly vaginate, 3-7 cm; upper leaves shortly stalked; blade triangular, 2-7 × 2-6 cm, bipinnate, glaucous, especially abaxially; leaflets cut into 2-5 oblanceolate to obovate obscurely mucronate segments. Racemes 3-5 cm, 12-20-flowered, 7-9 cm in fruit; lowermost bracts triangular-ovate, to 12 mm, bipinnately divided; upper ones 4-8 mm, palmatilobate, with 5-7 segments. Pedicel 3-5 mm, reflexed in fruit. Sepals ca. 1 mm, divided to base into narrow lobes. Corolla pale to bright yellow, keels of outer petals and veins at petal base often brownish purple, broadly triangular; outer petals with broad entire crest 1-2 mm high, much overtopping apex; upper petal 7-9 mm; spur short, 3-4 mm, obtuse; nectary ca. 2/3 as long as spur; inner petals 5-6 mm; lower petal 6-8 mm, base distinctly saccate. Stigma with 4 apical papillae. Capsule short, broad, 6-8 × 4-5 mm, 5-8-seeded; style sharply set off, ca. 3 mm. Seeds in 2 rows, 1.3-1.6 mm, smooth or densely muricate (at least sometimes coexisting in a population). Fl. and fr. Jul-Sep.
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