Vicia americana subsp. americana

American vetch, American Vetch

Family: Fabaceae · Type: perennial · Native

American vetch is a California native perennial found in the California Floristic Province and Great Basin regions in open, moist forests and along streams at elevations below 2,400 meters. Flowering from March to June, this plant produces blue-purple to lavender flowers in clusters of 3 to 9 blooms, each flower 15 to 25 millimeters long. Growing with sprawling or short erect stems up to one meter tall, the plant has a delicate, climbing habit. Its compound leaves feature 8 to 16 leaflets, each widely elliptic or wedge-shaped, measuring 1 to 3.5 centimeters long with acute or notched tips. The fruit is a pod 2.5 to 3 centimeters long, which can be either glabrous or slightly hairy.

Habitat: Generally open, moist forest, along streams, disturbed areas

Bloom period: Mar-Jun

Elevation: < 2400 m

Bioregions: CA-FP (exc NCo, SCoRI, s ChI), GB (exc Wrn, W&ampI)

California counties: Inyo, Kern, Tuolumne, San Bernardino, Los Angeles, San Diego, Tulare, Mono, Napa, Orange, Riverside, Alpine, Placer, Marin, Sierra, Siskiyou, Shasta, Modoc, Butte, Tehama, Mendocino, Fresno, San Mateo, Contra Costa, Del Norte, Humboldt, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, San Francisco, Trinity, Madera, Ventura, San Benito, Santa Cruz, Calaveras, El Dorado, Sonoma, Mariposa, Solano, Lake, Lassen, Colusa, Nevada, Yolo, Alameda, Amador, Monterey

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