Medicago polymorpha
Family: Fabaceae
Plant Description: Annual with reclining or prostrate stems to 40 cm or longer; sprawling. Leaves, alternate, trifoliate with leaflets 8-16 mm long. Flowers few per head, strongly bilateral, pea-shaped, the upper petals 4-5 mm long, yellow. Legumes curled up, prickly.
Field Identification: Common Spring ground cover with trifoliate leaves, small pea flowers, and seed pods forming “soft” stickers.
Plant Trivia: Native to Eurasia. Handling plant and touching eyes can cause eye irritation. Medicago species are very similar to one another.
Occurrence: Common to waste places and along roads.
Bloom Period: Mar-June
Plant Use:
Key to the Gens Medicago:
- Flowers purple-violet…………………………………………….M. sativa
Flowers yellow……………………………………………………………………….2
2. Fruits prickly……………………………………………….M. polymorpha
Fruits smooth………………………………………………………………………..3
3. Leaflets glabrous…………………………………………M. orbicularis
Leaflets hairy……………………………………………………M. lupulina
