Plant Name
Scientific Name: Lupinus sparsiflorus
Common Names: Coulter's Lupine, Mojave Lupine
Plant Characteristics
Duration: Annual
Growth Habit: Herb/Forb
Arizona Native Status: Native
Habitat: Desert
Flower Color: Violet-blue, White (rare)
Flowering Season: Winter (late), Spring
Height: To 16 inches (41 cm) tall
Description: The pea-like flowers are spiraled around the hairy, upright flower spikes. The individual flowers are 1/2 inch (1.3 cm) long and have a brown-spotted, yellow and white banner spot that becomes magenta-tinged with age. The keel petals curve upward and have a hairy fringe. The leaves are green and palmately compound with 7 to 11 linear to narrowly oblanceolate, partly folded leaflets. The upper surfaces of the leaflets are covered in spreading and flat-lying hairs and are hairiest near the margins.
The similar Arizona Lupine (Lupinus arizonicus) has pinkish purple flowers and broader leaflets with no hair on the upper surfaces.
Special Characteristics
Poisonous – The plants and most especially the seeds are poisonous and contain toxic quinolizidine alkaloids including lupinine and sparteine.
Classification
Kingdom: Plantae – Plants
Subkingdom: Tracheobionta – Vascular plants
Superdivision: Spermatophyta – Seed plants
Division: Magnoliophyta – Flowering plants
Class: Magnoliopsida – Dicotyledons
Subclass: Rosidae
Order: Fabales
Family: Fabaceae – Pea family
Genus: Lupinus L. – lupine
Species: Lupinus sparsiflorus Benth. – Coulter's lupine
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