Dalea leporina(Aiton) Bullock

foxtail prairie clover

WFO wfo-0000171967 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Dalea leporina, photographed by Sol Quipildor
fig. a Sol Quipildor, CC BY-SA 4.0 / 2021-04-04 / obs. 119041114

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

The specimen a real sheet, in a real collection

Herbarium
The New York Botanical Garden
Accession
01270159
Filed as
Dalea leporina Ait. ex Hemsl.
Det. by
R. C. Barneby 1962-01-01
Collected
A. Fendler 1847
Origin
US
The sheet
View the digitised specimen (CC BY 4.0)

A real pressed plant, in a real collection, under the accession number above. Not an illustration of one. The holding institution does not serve this sheet’s image to third parties, so there is no photograph here. The record is real and the link goes to it. Where we hold no openly licensed sheet for a species this section is simply absent, and where a sheet never recorded who determined it, that field stays empty rather than being filled in. Roughly half of all herbarium sheets never recorded a determiner, which is ordinary.

Native range 27 botanical countries

Regions where Dalea leporina is native: Arizona, Colorado, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Mexico Central, Mexico Gulf, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Northwest, Mexico Southeast, Mexico Southwest, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Wisconsin, Argentina Northwest, Bolivia, Chile North, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Peru ArizonaColoradoIndianaIowaKansasMexico CentralMexico GulfMexico NortheastMexico NorthwestMexico SoutheastMexico SouthwestMinnesotaMississippiMissouriNebraskaNew MexicoNorth DakotaSouth DakotaTennesseeTexasWisconsinArgentina NorthwestBoliviaChile NorthCosta RicaGuatemalaPeru
Native distribution of Dalea leporina, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Arizona ARI NORTHERN AMERICA
Colorado COL
Indiana INI
Iowa IOW
Kansas KAN
Mexico Central MXC
Mexico Gulf MXG
Mexico Northeast MXE
Mexico Northwest MXN
Mexico Southeast MXT
Mexico Southwest MXS
Minnesota MIN
Mississippi MSI
Missouri MSO
Nebraska NEB
New Mexico NWM
North Dakota NDA
South Dakota SDA
Tennessee TEN
Texas TEX
Wisconsin WIS
Argentina Northwest AGW SOUTHERN AMERICA
Bolivia BOL
Chile North CLN
Costa Rica COS
Guatemala GUA
Peru PER

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Where it actually grows measured, from 353 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low -7.8 °C 5.5 °C 10.7 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 21.5 °C 24.2 °C 32.1 °C
Annual rainfall 395 mm 795 mm 1,677 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 16 mm 34 mm 82 mm

It is found where winters bring hard frost. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 353 research-grade observations of Dalea leporina that carry a coordinate, and this is the range those places actually span. The 5th and 95th percentiles are used rather than the minimum and maximum, because a single cultivated specimen in a heated conservatory should not widen a tropical plant's range to the Arctic.

This is not a hardiness zone. A USDA zone is the average annual extreme minimum temperature. The figure above is the mean daily minimum of the coldest month, which is a different quantity and is typically far warmer. Reading one as the other would place a plant several zones too warm, so we do not publish a hardiness zone, because we do not have one.

Also published as 22 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Dalea alba Michx.
  • Dalea alopecuroides Willd.
  • Dalea annua var. alopecuroides (Willd.) Kuntze
  • Dalea bigelovii (Rydb.) B.L.Turner
  • Dalea lagopus (Cav.) Willd.
  • Dalea leporina var. alba (Michx.) H.D.Harr.
  • Dalea linnaei Michx.
  • Dalea oreophila (Cory) Cory
  • Dalea pedunculata Pursh
  • Parosela alopecuroides (Willd.) Rydb.
  • Parosela bigelovii Rydb.
  • Parosela costaricana Rydb.
  • Parosela lagopus Cav.
  • Parosela leporina (Aiton) Rydb.
  • Parosela leporina var. alba J.F.Macbr.
  • Petalostemon alopecuroides (Willd.) Pers.
  • Petalostemon oreophilum Cory
  • Petalostemon oreophilus Cory
  • Psoralea alopecuroides (Willd.) Poir.
  • Psoralea lagopus Cav.
  • Psoralea leporina Aiton
  • Psoralea pedunculata Poir.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
  4. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.