Dalea scariosa (La Jolla Prairie Clover)
PAROSELA SCARIOSA (S. WATSON) A. HELLER; PETALOSTEMON PROSTRATUM WOOTON & STANDLEY; PETALOSTEMON SCARIOSUM (S. WATSON) WEMPLE
Strong perennial from a stout taproot; stems prostrate to spreading, 20-70 cm long; leaves pinnately compound, 1-2.5 cm long, bright green, leaflets 5-9, thick, broadest near tip, 3-8 mm long; flowers in spikes, zygomorphic, pea-like, petals 5, pale pink to pink-purple, 7-8 mm long, the calyx with 5 pointed teeth, the vase-like base 5-ribbed and dotted with orange or reddish glands; pod 3-4 mm long, plump, dotted with small glands like the calyx. Flowers August and September.
There are many species of Dalea in New Mexico. The combination of herbaceous habit, spreading stems, bright green glabrous foliage, few small leaflets, and concolorous petals helps to distinguish this species from others.
New Mexico, Bernalillo, Sandoval, Socorro, and Valencia counties, central Rio Grande Basin.
Open sandy clay banks and bluffs, often along roadsides, at about 1,450-1,500 m (4,750-4,900 ft).
This plant is often locally abundant within its restricted area of distribution, frequently occurring on sites disturbed just a few years earlier.
The species has a resinous odor, and probably is largely unpalatable to most livestock. Plants are often found along recently disturbed road right-of-ways and, thus, may be rather early successional.
*New Mexico Native Plants Protection Advisory Committee. 1984. A handbook of rare and endemic plants of New Mexico. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.
*Barneby, R.C. 1977. Daleae imagines. Memoirs of the New York Botanical Garden 27:1-891.
Wemple, D.K. 1970. Revision of the genus Petalostemum (Leguminosae). Iowa State Journal of Science 45:1-102.
For distribution maps and more information, visit Natural Heritage New Mexico