Duration: Perennial

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Forb/Herb

General: Perennial with erect or ascending stems to 40 cm tall, grayish-strigose, radiating out from root crown, freely branching.

Leaves: Sessile, appearing digitate from reduction of the rachis, palmately compound with generally 3-5 leaflets 6-20 mm long, linear to linear-oblong, strigose, tiny stipules.

Flowers: Sessile in leaf axils or on short peduncle, in groups of 1-3, bracts simple; calyx 6-8 mm long, teeth shorter or equal to tube, corolla 10-15 mm long, yellow to orange becoming reddish orange in age, obtuse keel.

Fruits: Pods 20-25 mm long, 2-3.5 mm wide, straight, minutely hairy with valves curling with dehiscence.

Ecology: Found in open, usually dry woods from 4,500-9,000 ft (1372-2743 m); flowers May-September.

Distribution: s UT, AZ, CO, NM; south to c MEX.

Notes: Distinguished by being an erect or ascending perennial with mostly appressed hairs throughout the plant; the nearly sessile (attached directly to the stem), palmately compound leaves (actually just appear digitate) with linear, pointed leaflets to 20 mm long; and the stalks below inflorescences (peduncles) which are much smaller than leaves to obsolete.

Ethnobotany: Used for stomachache, as a cathartic, as a life medicine, as a witchcraft medicine, and for deer infection.

Etymology: Acmispon comes from the Greek acme for point or hook, while wrightii is named for Charles Wright (1811-1885) an American botanical collector.

Synonyms: Lotus wrightii, Hosackia wrightii

Editor: SBuckley 2010, FSCoburn 2015

Lotus wrightii is easily recognized by its upright growth habit and red and yellow flowers. It is a perennial with sessile, pubescent leaves that are palmately divided in to four to seven leaflets. Lotus wrightii is found in dry areas in lower to middle elevation.