Acmispon strigosus

Acmispon strigosus (Nutt.) Brouillet (Fabaceae), formerly placed in Lotus as L. strigosus, is the strigose bird's-foot trefoil, a slender annual herb 10-40 cm tall, native to the deserts and dry slopes of the southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico, where it occurs in sandy washes, open scrub and roadsides from sea level to about 1500 m. Stems are prostrate to ascending, branched from the base and clothed in short appressed strigose hairs. Leaves are alternate and pinnately compound with three to nine elliptic to obovate leaflets 4-12 mm long, lacking obvious stipules. Inflorescences are mostly axillary umbels of one to three small pea flowers; corollas are pale yellow, often tinged or veined red and aging orange-red, 5-9 mm long, subtended by a tiny three-lobed leafy bract. Fruits are slender linear glabrous to strigose pods 1.5-3 cm long containing several smooth mottled seeds. It is a winter annual frequent after rains.