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Showy tick-trefoil flowers are about a 1/2" tall and 1" long, pea-like with five petals — an upper petal (banner or standard) with two elongate, yellowish-cream spots at its base, two lower petals (wings) forming a chamber perpendicular to the upper petal, and another pair of petals forming a "keel" within the wings. Emerging from between the wings and keel is a stout, upward-curved, white tube that bears a single style and several stamens at its tip.

Desmodium

Desmodium canadense

showy tick-trefoil [Blooms: Jun-Jul]

Panicled tick-trefoil flowers have an upright banner (standard) with one or two patches of yellow-green near its base and two lateral wings that enclose the two petals that form the median keel; a robust column bearing the style and several stamens on its end pokes up through the keel and wings. The loments (seedpods) are covered in robust, hooked hairs, are 1/2-1.5" long, and have 2-6 rounded, incompletely separated segments; the segments are slightly convex on top and markedly angular-convex on the bottom.

Desmodium

Desmodium paniculatum

panicled tick-trefoil [Blooms: Aug]