Humularia welwitschii (Taub.) P.A.Duvign.

Leguminosae, B. Verdcourt. Flora Zambesiaca 3:6. 2000

Morphology General Habit

Erect shrub or subshrub 0.15–1 m tall.

Morphology Stem

Stems mostly robust and woody, branched, subcylindrical, glabrous, pubescent or densely scabrous with tubercular-based hairs, viscid-glandular.

Morphology Leaves

Leaves 6–16(22)-foliolate; leaflets 9–45 × 5–30 mm, elliptic or elliptic-oblong, often oblique, obtuse to acute and mucronulate at the apex, obliquely unequally rounded at the base, glabrous or glandular-serrate; the main nerve oblique dividing the lamina into unequal parts, the one 1.5–2 times as broad as the other; venation strongly reticulate, there being 5 other basal nerves; petiole 10–15 mm long; rhachis 2.5–7 cm long, with similar indumentum to the stem, the rhachis prolonged into a bristle 3 mm long; stipules 6–20 × 4–15 mm, elliptic or elliptic-oblong, rounded at base and apex, glabrous to densely scabrid with tubercular-based hairs, densely veined with numerous approximate basal nerves.

Morphology Reproductive morphology Inflorescences

Inflorescences often borne on branches with leaves reduced to stipules, 4–6 cm long, mostly densely strobilate; peduncle 1–2 cm long, scabrid-pubescent; pedicels 5 mm long, pubescent; bracts yellow, 8–25 × 15–24 mm, rounded, divided for one-sixth to half of their length into two rounded lobes which are venose, glabrous to densely covered with tubercular-based hairs; bracteoles 4–6 × 1.5–2.5 mm, oblong to ovate-lanceolate, ciliate and with tubercular-based hairs.

Morphology Reproductive morphology Flowers Calyx

Calyx lobes 10–11 × 5 mm, elliptic-oblong, the upper shortly 2-fid, the lower shortly distinctly 3-fid.

Morphology Reproductive morphology Flowers Corolla

Standard yellow, 12–17 × 7–12 mm, rectangular with upper half broadly widened and rounded.

Morphology Reproductive morphology Fruits

Fruit of 1–2 articles, each article half-elliptic, the upper margin straight, the lower very strongly curved, 5–6 mm long and wide, glandular-pubescent.

Morphology Reproductive morphology Seeds

Seeds dark reddish-brown, 4 mm long and wide, 2 mm thick, irregularly oblong in outline; the small hilum eccentric.

International Legume Database and Information Service

Conservation

Not Threatened

Morphology General Habit

Perennial, Not climbing, Shrub