Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Annual herbs.

Stems: Stems erect, up to 15 dm long, striate, appressed short–pubescent, taproot with slender branches, nodules often present.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves compound (trifoliolate). Alternate. Leaflets narrowly elliptic or narrowly lanceolate, 12.2–8 cm long, 0.2–0.8 cm wide. Apex rounded or acute, occasionally mucronulate. Base cuneate or rounded. Upper surfaces glabrous or sparsely pubescent; lower surfaces appressed short–pubescent. Margins entire. Veins 7–10 on each side of midvein. Petioles 13–30 mm long. Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers in racemes, flowers 11–18.5 mm long, 12–20 in terminal, somewhat lax inflorescences, rachis 10–30 cm long (incl. peduncle), bracts linear–triangular, 2–3 mm long, spreading, usually persistent. Flowers papilionaceous; bracteoles at base of calyx, linear–triangular. Calyx glabrous or nearly so, the tube 3.9–4 mm long, the lobes 1.3–2 mm long, lateral lobes distinct at apex. Calyx slightly bilabiate, the lobes shorter than to longer than the tube. Petals yellow with lines near base, standard ca. 12 mm long, ca. 10 mm wide, wings oblong, ca. 14 mm long, ca. 5 mm wide, keel petals striate, with non–twisted beak prolonged, margins ciliate. Stamens 10, connate into a tube, the tube split at least at base on the upper side; anthers dimorphic, alternately long (and basifixed) and short (and versatile). Elongated anthers ca. 5 mm long, short ones ca. 1 mm long. Ovary superior.

Fruit: Pods brown at maturity; (2.2–)4–5 cm long; stipitate; the stipe less than 3 mm long; appressed short–pubescent. Seeds ca. 75 or more per pod; yellowish orange; 2.2–3 mm long; smooth.

Ploidy: 2n = 16

Habitat: Along roadsides at least at Ulumalu and in Makawao Forest Reserve.

Elevation Range: 250–670 m.