Galactia microphylla (Chapm.) H.J. Rogers ex D.W. Hall & D.B. Ward

Little Leaf Milk Pea

Herb

Perennial

Vascular

Little Leaf Milk Pea is a native herbaceous perennial in the Bean family (Fabaceae). It is native to the southern half of Alabama. Little Leaf Milk Pea occurs in sand hills, in scrub oak woods, in xeric sandy Longleaf pine forests, and on roadsides. It is a perennial with a thick, elongate taproot. Each root crown produces 1-several spreading procumbent stems. The stems are not twining. The stems are green or brown in color and pubescent with deflexed or appressed hairs. Leaves are alternate, petiolate, and 3-foliate. The leaflets are elliptic to ovate in outline with rounded apices and entire margins. The leaflets are dark green, glossy, and slightly pubescent with appressed hairs above, and light green and short pubescent to glabrate below. The flowers are solitary or in 2-6 flowered racemes from the leaf axils. Each flower has a campanulate calyx with 5 lobes that appears as 4-lobed (the upper two lobes are fused). The corolla is papilionaceous and pink-purple in color. The fruit is a laterally compressed legume with 3-8 seed.--A. Diamond

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Native

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