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Vicia ludoviciana Nutt. var. ludoviciana .=Vicia exigua
Fabaceae (Pea Family)NativeSlender Vetch |
April Photo
Plant Characteristics:
Slender-stemmed annual, 3-6 dm. high, climbing, +/- strigose-villous;
stipules entire, semisagittate; lfts. 2-6 pairs, linear, 1-2.5 cm., long,
rounded to obtuse or emarginate, +/- strigose, especially beneath; tendrils well
developed; peduncles filiform, shorter than the lvs., 1-2 fld.; calyx 5-cleft,
ca. 2 mm. long, the teeth triangular-subulate; corolla white to purplish, ca. 5
mm. long; stamens diadelphous (9 + 1); pods glabrous, 2-3 cm. long; 2-2.5 mm.
wide.
Habitat:
Grassy, brushy or wooded slopes below 2000 ft., largely Coastal Sage
Scrub, Chaparral, S. Oak Wd., Channel Ids.; cismontane, L. Calif. n.; to Ore.
April-June.
Name:
Latin, vicia, the classical
name. (Munz, Flora
So. Calif. 476). Latin, exiguus,
short, small. (Jaeger 99). Exigua may refer to
the short calyx. (my comment).
Exigua may also refer to the
small flowers, or the small size of the plants.
Some vetches are large plants and have larger flowers.
(John Johnson). Latin, ludo,
to play, a player, to imitate (Simpson 352) and Latin, vicia, vetch. (Jaeger
281). Ludoviciana, to imitate a vetch.
General:
Rare in the study area, having been found only at the base of the
Castaway's Bluffs, roughly below where the old restaurant once stood. I find no information in my references that any of the
species of Vicia were used by any of
the early people of California. (my
comments).
About 30 species of the Northern Hemisphere and temperate South America.
(Munz, Flora So. Calif. 476).
California plants of this variable species are +/- identical to a race in
s. Texas and closely related to V. hassei.
(Hickman, Ed. 656).
Text Ref:
Abrams, Vol. II 616; Hickman, Ed. 656; Munz, Flora
So. Calif. 477; Roberts 25.
Photo Ref:
Dec-April 92-93 # 22,24; April 93 # 2.
Identity: by R. De Ruff,
confirmed by John Johnson.
Computer Ref: Plant Data 446
Have plant specimen.
Last edit 1/22/03.
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April Photo