Astragalus alopecurus

Astragalus alopecurus Pall. (Fabaceae), the foxtail milkvetch, is a stout perennial herb of montane and subalpine grasslands and rocky slopes, ranging across the mountains of southern and central Europe — notably the Pyrenees, Alps, Carpathians and Balkans — eastward into Anatolia, the Caucasus and Central Asia. Plants form a robust caudex from which arise erect, leafy stems 30-80 cm tall, densely covered with short appressed hairs. The pinnately compound leaves are 10-25 cm long with 15-30 pairs of oblong-elliptic leaflets 1-3 cm long, softly pubescent on both surfaces. The inflorescence is a dense, ovoid to cylindrical, foxtail-like spike 5-10 cm long borne on a long axillary peduncle and packed with numerous pale yellow pea-flowers about 2 cm long; the calyx is densely shaggy with long white and dark hairs. The pod is ovoid, inflated, hairy and enclosed in the persistent calyx. It grows on calcareous and acidic substrates between roughly 1,500 and 2,500 m.