Acaulescent. Herbage silvery strigose with long and short hairs. Leaflets 7 to 21, lanceolate, 5–15 mm long. Stipules membranous, adnate to the petiole, pilose. Inflorescence of 5 to 30 flowers, 8–20 cm high including the peduncle. Flowers magenta, fading to blue; calyx hirsute with white hairs; sepals 2–6 mm long, narrowly lanceolate; banner 15–23 mm long; wings 2-lobed. Legumes ascending, 15–20 mm long, white-villous, inflated, rupturing the persistent calyx (
Lesica et al. 2012. Manual of Montana Vascular Plants. BRIT Press. Fort Worth, TX).
In Montana we have varieties
besseyi,
argophylla (Rydb.) Barneby,
fallax Barneby, and
ventosa (Greene) Barneby (Kartesz in prep. 2012), although Lesica (2012) only recognizes the first two listed.
Sparsely-vegetated, stony soil of grasslands, steppe, dry woodlands; plains, valleys to subalpine (
Lesica et al. 2012. Manual of Montana Vascular Plants. BRIT Press. Fort Worth, TX).
POLLINATORS The following animal species have been reported as pollinators of this plant species or its genus where their geographic ranges overlap:
Bombus appositus,
Bombus bifarius,
Bombus centralis,
Bombus fervidus,
Bombus flavifrons,
Bombus melanopygus,
Bombus nevadensis,
Bombus rufocinctus,
Bombus sylvicola,
Bombus occidentalis,
Bombus insularis, and
Bombus kirbiellus (Macior 1974, Bauer 1983, Shaw and Taylor 1986, Williams et al. 2014, Miller-Struttmann and Galen 2014).