About Indigofera caroliniana Mill.
Indigofera caroliniana Mill. is a partially woody (suffruticose) herbaceous plant. It typically grows 0.5 to 1.2 meters tall, and can occasionally reach 2 meters in height. Its leaves are 5 to 10 centimeters long, odd-pinnate, with a finely hairy rachis, and hold 9 to 15 obovate to oblanceolate leaflets. Each leaflet measures 1 to 2.5 centimeters long and 5 to 10 millimeters wide. Both leaflet surfaces are covered in fine minute strigillose hairs, with trichomes that attach at their midpoint, and leaflets are stipellate. The inflorescences are slender axillary or terminal racemes, 6 to 20 centimeters long, and usually longer than the leaf they grow from. Flowers are loosely arranged, each borne on a roughly 1 millimeter pedicel with a small triangular bract. Petals range in color from pinkish to yellowish-brown; the standard and keel petals are 5 to 6 millimeters long, while the wing petals are slightly shorter and adhere to the pouched keel. The stamens are diadelphous, arranged in a 9+1 pattern, with the connective extending above the anthers. The fruit is a short-stipitate, beaked legume that is 5 to 10 millimeters long, and holds one to three seeds. The root system of Indigofera caroliniana produces stem tubers that store non-structural carbohydrates. These tubers let the plant resprout after fire and persist through periods without fire. Indigofera caroliniana is distributed from eastern North Carolina south to South Florida, and west to southeastern Louisiana. It grows in longleaf pine sandhills, maritime forests, Florida scrub, and other types of sandy forests and woodlands.
