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Astragalus ceramicus variety ceramicus Fabaceae (Pea Family) Semi-desert.
Sand in openings, shrublands, woodlands. Spring summer. Two of the three varieties of Astragalus ceramicus grow in the Four Corners area: variety ceramicus and variety filifolius. The latter has very narrow grass-like, filiform leaves, one-to-five inches long with no lateral leaflets or just a few lateral leaflets at the base of the plant. Astragalus ceramicus variety ceramicus, pictured on this page, has about five-to-fifteen narrow leaflets, a gray-green cast, and is most easily recognized by its size (typically only a few inches tall -- but in some populations up to ten inches tall) and by its characteristic habit of spreading over many square feet. It does the latter because it sends out an extensive underground system of roots which then sprout new plants -- as especially shown in the photograph at the top of this page. Frederick Pursh described this species in 1814 and named it Psoralea longifolia. The first specimen was collected by John Bradbury in the "upper Louisiana" Territory in 1811. The plant has undergone numerous name changes: Orobus longifolius, Astragalus filifolius, Astragalus imperfectus variety ceramicus, Phaca picta, Astragalus picta, etc. Eventually in 1894 Edmund Sheldon named it Astragalus ceramicus. |
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Astragalus ceramicus variety ceramicus Semi-desert.
Sand in openings, shrublands, woodlands. Spring summer. |
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Astragalus ceramicus variety ceramicus Semi-desert.
Sand in openings, shrublands, woodlands. Spring summer. |
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Astragalus ceramicus variety ceramicus Semi-desert.
Sand in openings, shrublands, woodlands. Spring summer.
While looking through a ten power hand lens at a plant part with malpighian hairs, push a pin against one end of a hair; both ends of the hairs will rotate in a circle because the hair swivels around its short, stubby attachment point. If you push against the end of a basifixed hair, only that end will rotate. The malpighian hairs on Astragalus ceramicus variety ceramicus so densely cover the surface of the leaves and stem that the overall appearance of the plant is not green but sage gray. |
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Astragalus ceramicus variety ceramicus Semi-desert.
Sand in openings, shrublands, woodlands. Spring summer. Flowers are lovely, delicate shades of lavender and white with stripes and sometimes dots. Even the calyx surrounding the base of the flowers has the white malpighian hairs. The final photograph shows the lovely, swollen pods that give rise to the specific epithet, "ceramicus". Someone thought the pattern was quite ceramic-like. |
Range map © John Kartesz,
County Color Key
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Range map for Astragalus ceramicus |
Leaves and stems of Astragalus ceramicus variety ceramicus are clothed in white malpighian hairs (also called "dolabriform" hairs), i.e., hairs which lie relatively flat against the plant surface but which are not attached at either end of the hair. Instead they are attached to the plant surface somewhere along the length of the hair (often toward the middle) by a very minute projection of the hair. The attachment near their center and the tapered points at both ends of the hair give the hairs the shape of a pick-axe head or the slightly upturned wings of a bird. 
Species present in state and native
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Questionable presence