托木尔黄耆 tuo mu er huang qi

Astragalus dsharkenticus var. gongliuensis S. B. Ho.

Plants subshrubby, 12-20 cm tall, with appressed ± medi­fixed hairs 0.5-1 mm. Stems several, branched at base, old parts lignified, stems of current year 3-10 cm, loosely hairy, some­times glabrescent. Leaves 4-8 cm; stipules 2-3 mm, shortly adnate to petiole, shortly connate behind stem, sparsely black and white hairy or nearly glabrous; petiole 1.2-2.5 cm, like rachis loosely hairy; leaflets in 4-9 pairs, narrowly elliptic, 5-20 × 3-4 mm, abaxially loosely hairy, adaxially sparsely hairy, apex rounded to subacute. Racemes short, densely 5-10-flow­ered; peduncle 5-15 cm, sparsely to loosely hairy; bracts 1.5-2 mm, sparsely black and white hairy. Calyx 11-13 mm, loosely covered with subappressed predominantly black hairs, some­times on ventral side with predominantly white and on dorsal side with predominantly black hairs; teeth 2-2.5 mm. Petals pale yellow; standard obovate, 20-22 × 7-8 mm, apex deeply emarginate, slightly constricted below middle; wings 16-19 mm, limbs oblong, apex obliquely and deeply emarginate; keel 13-17 mm. Legumes with a stipe ca. 2 mm, erect to spreading, linear, slightly to distinctly upcurved to nearly semicircular, 25-30 mm, 3-3.5 mm high and wide, with a straight beak ca. 1 mm, 2-locular; valves densely covered with ascending to spreading, strongly asymmetrically bifurcate, white hairs up to 1.2 mm and with mostly distinctly shorter and more sym­metrically bifurcate black hairs.

Steppes; ca. 1800 m. NW Xinjiang [Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan].

Astragalus dsharkenticus var. gongliuensis is said to differ from the typical variety mainly by its 6-13 (instead of 4-9) pairs of leaflets.