Foothill Deervetch

Acmispon brachycarpus

Foothill deervetch blooming at Academy Village

About the Plant

This annual native spring-blooming wildflower has yellow flowers that are often tinged with orange. The plant stays low, only an inch high, but can spread to 6 inches or greater. This is not a showy plant, as the flowers are never abundant. Deervetch needs no care from you other than to leave it alone until it dies back and seeds are released.

Foothill deervetch is very similar to strigose bird's foot trefoil and they can often be found together. Both are native to southwestern US. To distinguish between them, look at the leaves. Foothill deervetch, to right in picture below, has 4 and only 4 leaflets per leaf. The leaflets are thin and not folded. Trefoil, shown to the left, has at least 5 leaflets per leaf and each leaflet appears folded and thick. 

Notes: Previous scientific name for this plant was Lotus humistratus

More Information

Weekly Plant on foothill deervetch

Map of distribution in US

Technical botanical description from SEINet

ID Characteristics

This plant is in the Fabaceae - the legume (pea and bean) family.
Foothill deervetch at Academy Village
Foothill deervetch grows low to the ground, only about an inch high.
The alternate leaves of foothill deervetch are compound with 4 leaflets. If you look at a single leaf, there will be 3 leaflets on one side and 1 on the other. Each leaflet is hairy, thin and flat, ending in a point.
The flowers are yellow, often with a hint of orange (see photo below), with the classic "pea" flower shape. The flowers are small, one-fourth of an inch at most, and appear stalkless. The plant may cover the earth but will never have the appearance of covering the earth with yellow flowers, for the flowers are never abundant.
The fruit is straight, only half an inch long, often with a curved "beak" at the end.