Trifolium microdon

Thimble clover

Family: Fabaceae · Type: annual · Native

Thimble clover is a California native annual herb found in coastal and inland regions including northern California Coast Ranges, northern Sierra Nevada foothills, Central Valley, Central Western California, Channel Islands, and Peninsular Ranges at elevations of 10 to 1,100 meters in open, moist or disturbed areas. Flowering from March to June, this plant produces white to pink flowers in compact heads 7 to 14 millimeters wide with bristle-tipped involucre divisions. Growing with decumbent to erect puberulent stems, it forms low-spreading or upright plants. Its leaves have three leaflets 5 to 15 millimeters long, oblanceolate to obovate with truncate or notched tips, positioned with wide stipules along the stem. Each flower cluster contains 5 to many small blossoms with a delicate, cup-shaped calyx.

Habitat: Common locally. Open, moist or dry, generally disturbed areas

Bloom period: Mar-Jun

Elevation: 10-1100 m

Bioregions: NCo, NCoR, n&ampc SNF, GV, CW, ChI, PR

California counties: Los Angeles, Ventura, Sonoma, Santa Barbara, Lake, Sacramento, Mendocino, San Francisco, Alameda, Marin, Napa, Del Norte, Humboldt, Solano, San Mateo, Contra Costa, Santa Cruz, Santa Clara, San Joaquin, Nevada, Tehama, Shasta, Butte, Monterey, Calaveras, Stanislaus, Trinity, San Luis Obispo, Mariposa, El Dorado, Tuolumne, Merced, Colusa, Plumas

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