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Dull-leaf Indigo (Amorpha fruticosa)

• Family: Pea (Fabaceae)
• Flowering: April-June.
• Field Marks: This shrub is distinguished by its leaves with 11-27 leaflets, its dense spikes of small, deep purple flowers, and its curved, glandular pods about 1/3 inch long.
• Habitat: Along rivers and streams, wet woods, around ponds.
• Habit: Shrub.
• Stems: Erect, much branched, smooth or somewhat hairy, up to 12 feet tall.
• Leaves: Alternate, pinnately divided into 11-27 leaflets, the leaflets oblong to elliptic, rounded at the tip except for a short mucro, rounded or tapering to the base, smooth or hairy, without teeth, up to 2 inches long.
• Flowers: Many crowded into erect racemes up to 8 inches long, dark purple.
• Sepals: 5, unequal in size, green, united to form a short, usually hairy cup.
• Petals: 1, purple, about 1/4 inch long.
• Stamens: 10, protruding above the petals.
• Pistils: Ovary superior.
• Fruits: Pods about 1/3 inch long, curved, smooth, glandular-dotted, containing 1-2 seeds.