Description:
Herbaceous or woody climbers or trailers. Leaves pinnately 3-foliolate; stipels present. Flowers blue or violet, small, in fascicles arranged in short to long axillary nodose pseudoracemes, or in axillary subsessile fascicles; bracts and bracteoles small, deciduous. Calyx campanulate or shortly tubular, 5-lobed, upper pair free or +/- connate to form a 2-toothed lip. Petals : standard obovate, auriculate at base, auricles inflexed; wings narrow, adhering to obtuse keel. Stamens : vexillary stamen free; anthers mostly 8 or 9, all similar. Ovary sessile, many-ovuled; style filiform or subulate, usually +/- incurved, glabrous or pubescent; stigma terminal, capitate. Pods linear or linear-oblong, +/- compressed, 2-valved, dehiscent, mostly septate between seeds, outer surface transversely furrowed, giving the appearance that pod might break into segments. Seeds compressed-globose or oblong.
Distribution:
Species 6-8, confined to the warmer parts of America; 1 species: *Calopogonium mucunoides Desv., now widely cultivated as a cover crop and often found as an escape in the Old World tropics; in sthn trop. Afr. reported as an escape in Malawi.
Source:
SSTA
Classification:
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