Astragalus obscurus

Arcane milkvetch

Family: Fabaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Arcane milkvetch is a California native perennial found in the southeastern Klamath Ranges, Cascade Range, and Modoc Plateau in rocky basalt and granite habitats at elevations of 800 to 2,150 meters. Flowering from May to July, this plant produces cream or dirty white flowers with a lilac tinge, with banner petals recurved at about 45 degrees. Growing with prostrate or tufted stems less than 15 centimeters tall and widely branched, it forms low, spreading clusters. Its leaves are 2.5 to 10 centimeters long, composed of 5 to 15 narrowly to widely elliptic leaflets that are 2 to 15 millimeters long and slightly thick. The fruit is an erect, linear-oblong pod 10 to 25 millimeters long, finely hairy and leathery with a thickened upper suture.

Habitat: Rocky, basalt, granite

Bloom period: May-Jul

Elevation: 800-2150 m

Bioregions: se KR, CaR, MP

California counties: Siskiyou, Modoc, Lassen, Trinity

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