''Amorpha californica'' is a species of flowering plant in the legume family known by the common name California false indigo. It is native to

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

Arizona Arizona is a U.S. state, state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States, sharing the Four Corners region of the western United States with Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah. It also borders Nevada to the nort ...

, and northern

Baja California Baja California, officially the Free and Sovereign State of Baja California, is a state in Mexico. It is the northwesternmost of the 32 federal entities of Mexico. Before becoming a state in 1952, the area was known as the North Territory of B ...

, where it grows in the

California chaparral and woodlands The California chaparral and woodlands is a terrestrial ecoregion of southwestern Oregon, northern, central, and southern California (United States) and northwestern Baja California (Mexico), located on the west coast of North America. It is a ...

and other

chaparral Chaparral ( ) is a shrubland plant plant community, community found primarily in California, southern Oregon, and northern Baja California. It is shaped by a Mediterranean climate (mild wet winters and hot dry summers) and infrequent, high-intens ...

and oak woodlands habitats. It is generally considered an

understory In forestry and ecology, understory (American English), or understorey (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English), also known as underbrush or undergrowth, includes plant life growing beneath the Canopy (biology), forest ca ...

plant.

Description

''Amorpha californica'' is a glandular, thorn-less

shrub A shrub or bush is a small to medium-sized perennial woody plant. Unlike herbaceous plants, shrubs have persistent woody stems above the ground. Shrubs can be either deciduous or evergreen. They are distinguished from trees by their multiple ...

with leaves made up of spiny, oval-shaped leaflets each tipped with a resin gland. The scattered

inflorescence In botany, an inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a plant's Plant stem, stem that is composed of a main branch or a system of branches. An inflorescence is categorized on the basis of the arrangement of flowers on a mai ...

s are spike-like

raceme A raceme () or racemoid is an unbranched, indeterminate growth, indeterminate type of inflorescence bearing flowers having short floral stalks along the shoots that bear the flowers. The oldest flowers grow close to the base and new flowers are ...

s of flowers, each flower with a single violet petal and ten protruding

stamen The stamen (: stamina or stamens) is a part consisting of the male reproductive organs of a flower. Collectively, the stamens form the androecium., p. 10 Morphology and terminology A stamen typically consists of a stalk called the filament ...

s. The fruit is a

legume Legumes are plants in the pea family Fabaceae (or Leguminosae), or the fruit or seeds of such plants. When used as a dry grain for human consumption, the seeds are also called pulses. Legumes are grown agriculturally, primarily for human consum ...

pod containing usually a single seed.

Subspecies

The standard variety is ''Amorpha californica'' var. ''californica''. ''Amorpha california'' var. ''napensis'' is a rare plant; it only grows around San Francisco and in the North Coast Ranges.

Butterflies

The

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

California dogface butterfly ''Zerene eurydice'', the California dogface butterfly, belongs to the family Pieridae and is a sister genus to ''Colias.'' ''The Zerene eurydice'' and the ''Colias'' both share the "characteristic of having yellow-orange and black wing coordinat ...

larvae feed on ''Amorpha californica'', along with the

Southern dogface ''Zerene cesonia'', the southern dogface, is a North and South American butterfly in the family Pieridae, subfamily Coliadinae (until recently the species was sometimes placed in the related genus ''Colias'' instead of ''Zerene''). Description ...

and the silver-spotted skipper.

References

External links

Jepson Manual Treatment - ''Amorpha californica''USDA Plants Profile: ''Amorpha californica''
*
''Amorpha californica'' - U.C. Photo gallery
*
The complete chloroplast genome of the threatened Napa False Indigo Amorpha californica var. napensis Jeps. 1925 (Fabaceae) from Northern California, USA
* Wilbur, Robert L. “A REVISION OF THE NORTH AMERICAN GENUS AMORPHA (LEGUMINOSAE-PSORALEAE).” Rhodora, vol. 77, no. 811, 1975, pp. 337–409. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/23311397. Accessed 1 Sep. 2022. californica Flora of California Flora of Arizona Flora of Baja California Flora of the Sierra Nevada (United States) Natural history of the California Coast Ranges Natural history of the Santa Monica Mountains Butterfly food plants Plants described in 1838 {{Faboideae-stub

Description

Subspecies

Butterflies

See also

References

External links