Erect bushy annual or short-lived perennial, with many rather spreading branches from near the base upwards, up to 3–10 dm. tall.. Stem densely pubescent, with generally both appressed and spreading hairs.. Leaves 3-foliolate; leaflets narrowly oblong-lanceolate to elliptic or obovate, up to 20–55(–70) mm. long, 10–24 mm. wide, glabrous above, thinly pubescent with fine appressed hairs beneath; petiole 20–35 mm. long.. Stipules up to 0–5 mm. long, caducous.. Racemes subsessile or shortly pedunculate, almost always dense, up to 3–8(–12) cm. long, many-flowered; bracts caudate-triangular, up to 1·5 mm. long; bracteoles inserted at the top of the pedicel, small, inconspicuous.. Calyx becoming broadly rounded at the base and deflexed against the pedicel, 3–4 mm. long, densely pubescent with fine irregularly arranged appressed or slightly spreading hairs; lobes triangular-acuminate, shorter than the tube.. Standard obovate, yellow, veined or sometimes suffused reddish-brown, glabrous outside; wings longer than the keel; keel semiorbicular, with a short blunt untwisted beak, 5–7 mm. long.. Pod practically sessile, subcylindrical, up to 17–22 mm. long, 5–7 mm. across, pubescent, ± 16–18-seeded.. Seeds very obliquely cordiform, 2·5–3 mm. long, smooth, ochre.. Fig. 127/9, p. 921.
Home