SPECIES DESCRIPTION
ASTRAGALUS SINAICUS
Family and Genus:- See- LEGUMINOSAE/Subgen. TRIMENIAEUS
Common Name:- None
Homotypic Synonyms:- Astragalus pseudostella, Astragalus sesamus.
Meaning:- Astragalus (Gr) Ankle-bone, (a plant with knotted roots).
Sinaicus (L) From Sinai, Egypt.
General description:- A laxly tufted short to medium annual.
Stems:-
1) Usually branched from the base, 3-12(-20) cm, sparsely white-pilose.
Leaves:-
1) Imparipinnate, 3-8 cm.
2) Leaflets, 7-10 pairs, oblong or elliptical, obtuse, rarely emarginate, densely hairy
on both surfaces, stipules connate to form a sheath.
Flowers:-
1) Inflorescence, sessile or subsessile in the leaf axils (rarely with a peduncle up to
4 cm), consisting of 3-7 subsessile flowers crowded into a dense head.
2) Calyx, 4-6 mm:
a) teeth, with black and white hairs.
3) Corolla, pale violet or mauve:
a) standard, 6.5-8 mm.
Fruit:-
1) Legumes, 8-15 x 2·5-4 mm, stellately patent, lanceolate-oblong, almost straight,
laterally compressed, but slightly dorsiventrally compressed at the base:
a) beak, straight or curved.
b) valves, not keeled, densely hairy with both short, appressed hairs and long,
patent or ascending hairs.
Key features:-
1) Legume, with both short, appressed hairs and long, patent or ascending hairs.
Habitat:- Open dry shrubby vegetation, dry grassland and streambeds,
wasteground. 0-400(-800) m.
Distribution:- Central Mediterranean from France and Corsica to Italy and Greece.
Rare on Crete mainly coastal areas south of the Dikti mountains.
Flowering time:- Mid-Mar to end of Apr.
Photos by:- Dr. Armin Jagel
