Galactia
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Authority
Acevedo-Rodríguez, Pedro. 2005. Vines and climbing plants of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. Contr. U. S. Natl. Herb. 51: 1-483.
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Family
Fabaceae
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Scientific Name
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Description
Description - Herbaceous or slightly woody vines, twining. Leaves alternate, trifoliolate or unifoliolate; stipels minute or absent; stipules minute, deciduous. Inflorescences of axillary or terminal pseudoracemes, the flowers grouped on the swellings along the rachis; bracts and bracteoles minute, deciduous or persistent. Calyx campanulate. with 4 lobes, elongate; corolla pink, lavender, white, or less frequently red, the standard elliptical or rounded, reflexed, narrow at the base, the wings appressed to the keel; stamens 10, monadelphous or diadelphous, unequal; ovary superior, sessile, pubescent, with numerous ovules, the style curved, glabrous, the stigma capitate. Fruit a flattened, linear legume, slighth curved. with a beak at the apex, dehiscent by twisting valves; seeds small, few, ovoid, brown. A genus of about 50 species, the majority of the New World tropics.