Duration: Perennial

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Forb/Herb

General: Perennial, 4-60 cm tall; stems erect or decumbent; herbage glabrous to sparsely pilose; taprooted.

Leaves: Mostly cauline, alternate, trifoliate, the leaflets oblanceolate to obovate, 3-10 mm long, distinctly pinnately veined, glabrous to sparsely pilose, apex obtuse or truncate, often shallowly notched; stipules lanceolate, margins entire or nearly so; blades petiolate.

Flowers: Inflorescence a head, ovoid, ellipsoid, or sub-globose in outline, 20-65 flowered; peduncle 2-12 cm long, sometimes longer; involucral bracts reduced to minute membranous scales; calyx 5.5-10 mm long, the teeth 2-3 times as long as the tube, sparsely pilose; corolla 12-18 mm long, white, cream, sometimes pink, banner 9-13 mm long; flowers June-September.

Fruits: Legume.

Ecology: Meadows, moist woods, coniferous forests, burned areas; 1800-2700 m (6000-9000 ft); Apache, Cochise, Coconino, Graham, Greenlee, Pima, Pinal, and Santa Cruz counties; southwestern U.S.

Notes: Trifolium mucronatum (spinytooth clover) [=T. lacerum] is an annual with elongate stems and glabrous herbage; leaflets are narrowly linear-lanceolate to oblanceolate, the apex often cuspidate, margins serrate and bristle- tipped; heads are 1-2 cm wide, subtended by an involucre with segments connate for at least 1/4 their length, saucer to bowl shaped, the involucre cleft and tipped with bristle-like teeth; corolla is 8-11 mm long, reddish purple. It occurs in meadows and moist habitats. Trifolium wormskioldii (cows clover) [=T. fendleri] is very similar but plants are perennial; heads are 2-4 cm wide; corolla is 12 mm long or longer. In Trifolium variegatum (white-tip clover, variegated clover) plants are annual; stems are erect to ascending; leaflets are oblanceolate, obovate, or obcordate, sometimes narrowly so; heads are less than or equaling 1 cm wide, subtended by a bowl-shaped involucre, the margins of the divisions irregularly toothed and bristle-tipped; petals are purple, the banner often white-tipped. Trifolium fragiferum (strawberry clover) is not very common within our range. It is distinguished primarily by its strongly asymmetric calyx tube, this becoming distinctly inflated and two-lipped in fruit, papery-membranous, net-veined, minutely pilose on the upper side; flower heads are bristly, globose, and subtended by an involucre, this concealed by the inflated calyces.

Editor: Springer et al. 2008