Common Name: New Mexico locust

Duration: Perennial

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Tree

General: Deciduous shrubs to small trees, from 2-7 m tall; bark light gray to brown, furrowed into scaly ridges with age; twigs brown, stout, covered in glandular hairs, with brown, curved stout paired spines 6-12 mm long at bases of leaves.

Leaves: Alternate along stem, pinnately compound, 10-25 cm long; leaflets 15-21, oblong 1.2-4 cm long, 0.6-2.5 cm wide, acute apex; bluish-green, hairy when young, turning yellow in fall.

Flowers: Inflorescence in clusters of 3-14 flowers, raceme 5-10 cm long, pedicels, peduncle, and calyces glandular-hispid and puberulent; calyx tube 6-8 mm long, 7-10 mm wide, purplish-pink, pea like.

Fruits: Pods 6-10 cm long, 7-10 mm wide, glandular-hispid, oblong and flat.

Ecology: Found in both canyons and open woods on a variety of soils from 4,000-8,500 ft (1219-2591 m); flowers May-July.

Notes: This shrub is best told apart by its spines, especially when they tear at your flesh. Often found in thickets, particularly in ponderosa communities and after fires.

Ethnobotany: Used as an emetic, the pods were cooked, stored, and eaten, flowers eaten raw, branches made good bows and arrows, and they were used in cradleboard construction.

Etymology: Robinia named for Jean (1550-1629) and Vespasian (1579-1662) Robin of Paris, gardeners to Henri IV and Louis XIII, while neomexicana means of or from New Mexico.

Synonyms: Robinia luxurians, Robinia neomexicana var. luxurians, Robinia neomexicana var. subvelutina

Editor: SBuckley, 2010