Astragalus bolanderi

Bolander's milkvetch

Family: Fabaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Bolander's milkvetch is a native perennial herb found in the high Cascade Range and Sierra Nevada Mountains in dry sandy, rocky areas on meadow margins at elevations of 1,400 to 3,300 meters. Flowering from June to September, this plant produces white to faintly lilac-tinged flowers in clusters of 7 to 18 blooms, with petals 13 to 17.6 millimeters long. Growing with stiff, sparsely leafy stems 15 to 40 centimeters tall, the plant has a decumbent to erect growth habit with fine, wavy or curly hairs. Its compound leaves are 3 to 16 centimeters long, featuring 13 to 27 oblanceolate to oblong leaflets 5 to 20 millimeters long with a prominent midrib. The distinctive fruit is a stiff-papery, swollen pod 10 to 30 millimeters long, with an incurved body and a wing-like outgrowth in each chamber.

Habitat: dry sandy, rocky areas on margins of meadows

Bloom period: Jun-Sep

Elevation: 1400-3300 m

Bioregions: CaRH, SNH

California counties: Fresno, Tulare, Amador, Plumas, El Dorado, Sierra, Tuolumne, Mariposa, Modoc, Calaveras, Madera, Stanislaus, Nevada, Placer, Shasta, Lassen, Alpine

Data from The California Species Project — 14,000+ California species with verified data from CNPS, CDFW, USFWS, Jepson eFlora, Cal-IPC, and more.