Psorothamnus arborescens
Encyclopedia
Psorothamnus arborescens is a species of flowering plant in the legume family
known by the common name Mojave indigo bush.
growing no more than a meter tall, its highly branching stems sometimes with thorns. The leaves are each made up of a few pairs of green linear to oval leaflets up to a centimeter in length.
The inflorescence
is a long raceme
of many flowers with reddish green calyces of sepal
s and bright purple pealike corollas up to a centimeter long. The fruit is a glandular legume pod up to a centimeter long containing one seed.
There are several varieties of this species which are generally similar in appearance.
Fabaceae
The Fabaceae or Leguminosae, commonly known as the legume, pea, or bean family, is a large and economically important family of flowering plants. The group is the third largest land plant family, behind only the Orchidaceae and Asteraceae, with 730 genera and over 19,400 species...
known by the common name Mojave indigo bush.
Distribution
Psorothamnus arborescens is native to southwestern North America, where it can be found in many types of desert habitat and dry mountainous areas. It is found in the San Bernardino Mountains, east of Sierra Nevada into Nevada, and the Mojave Desert south into Northwestern Mexico.Description
Psorothamnus arborescens is a shrubShrub
A shrub or bush is distinguished from a tree by its multiple stems and shorter height, usually under 5–6 m tall. A large number of plants may become either shrubs or trees, depending on the growing conditions they experience...
growing no more than a meter tall, its highly branching stems sometimes with thorns. The leaves are each made up of a few pairs of green linear to oval leaflets up to a centimeter in length.
The inflorescence
Inflorescence
An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Strictly, it is the part of the shoot of seed plants where flowers are formed and which is accordingly modified...
is a long raceme
Raceme
A raceme is a type of inflorescence that is unbranched and indeterminate and bears pedicellate flowers — flowers having short floral stalks called pedicels — along the axis. In botany, axis means a shoot, in this case one bearing the flowers. In a raceme, the oldest flowers are borne...
of many flowers with reddish green calyces of sepal
Sepal
A sepal is a part of the flower of angiosperms . Collectively the sepals form the calyx, which is the outermost whorl of parts that form a flower. Usually green, sepals have the typical function of protecting the petals when the flower is in bud...
s and bright purple pealike corollas up to a centimeter long. The fruit is a glandular legume pod up to a centimeter long containing one seed.
There are several varieties of this species which are generally similar in appearance.