Medicago turbinata(L.) All.

southern medick

WFO wfo-0001055366 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 4 observations

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 4 times, so some figures below are different views of the same plant, taken on the same day, rather than different individuals. They are usually different parts of it: the leaf, the flower, the bark.

Medicago turbinata, photographed by Eleftherios Katsillis
fig. a Eleftherios Katsillis, CC BY 4.0 / 2021-04-06 / obs. 119395251
Medicago turbinata, photographed by Eleftherios Katsillis
fig. b Eleftherios Katsillis, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 115648520
Medicago turbinata, photographed by Eleftherios Katsillis
fig. c Eleftherios Katsillis, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 115651314
Medicago turbinata, photographed by Eleftherios Katsillis
fig. d Eleftherios Katsillis, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 115651755
Medicago turbinata, photographed by Eleftherios Katsillis
fig. e Eleftherios Katsillis, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 119395225
Medicago turbinata, photographed by Eleftherios Katsillis
fig. f Eleftherios Katsillis, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 115651628
Medicago turbinata, photographed by Eleftherios Katsillis
fig. g Eleftherios Katsillis, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 115651342
Medicago turbinata, photographed by Eleftherios Katsillis
fig. h Eleftherios Katsillis, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 115648492

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.

Native range 23 botanical countries

Regions where Medicago turbinata is native: Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia, Cyprus, East Aegean Is., Iraq, Lebanon-Syria, Palestine, Türkiye, Baleares, Bulgaria, Corse, France, Greece, Italy, Kriti, NW. Balkan Pen., Portugal, Sardegna, Sicilia, Spain AlgeriaEgyptLibyaMoroccoTunisiaCyprusEast Aegean Is.IraqLebanon-SyriaPalestineTürkiyeBulgariaCorseFranceGreeceItalyKritiNW. Balkan Pen.PortugalSiciliaSpain BalearesSardegna
Native distribution of Medicago turbinata, 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. Regions too small to draw at this scale are marked with a dot.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Baleares BAL EUROPE
Bulgaria BUL
Corse COR
France FRA
Greece GRC
Italy ITA
Kriti KRI
NW. Balkan Pen. YUG
Portugal POR
Sardegna SAR
Sicilia SIC
Spain SPA
Cyprus CYP ASIA-TEMPERATE
East Aegean Is. EAI
Iraq IRQ
Lebanon-Syria LBS
Palestine PAL
Türkiye TUR
Algeria ALG AFRICA
Egypt EGY
Libya LBY
Morocco MOR
Tunisia TUN

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 51 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 2.0 °C 7.1 °C 12.0 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 25.4 °C 31.6 °C 34.9 °C
Annual rainfall 474 mm 670 mm 991 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 2 mm 3 mm 21 mm

It is found where winters are cool but frost is light or absent. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 51 research-grade observations of Medicago turbinata 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 27 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.

  • Medicago apiculata Bastard
  • Medicago catalonica Schrank
  • Medicago compressa Biroli ex Colla
  • Medicago polymorpha var. tuberculata Retz.
  • Medicago polymorpha var. turbinata L.
  • Medicago pubescens DC.
  • Medicago rugosa d'Urv.
  • Medicago sphaerocarpa Costa
  • Medicago spinulosa DC.
  • Medicago terebellum var. catalonica (Schrank) W.D.J.Koch
  • Medicago tuberculata (Retz.) Willd.
  • Medicago tuberculata f. dextrorsa Urb.
  • Medicago tuberculata f. pubescens (DC.) Urb.
  • Medicago tuberculata f. sinistrorsa Urb.
  • Medicago tuberculata var. aculeata Moris
  • Medicago tuberculata var. apiculata Eichler
  • Medicago tuberculata var. brevispina Rouy
  • Medicago tuberculata var. catalonica (Schrank) Pau
  • Medicago tuberculata var. chiotica Urb.
  • Medicago tuberculata var. spinulosa (DC.) Rouy
  • Medicago tuberculata var. submutica Evenari
  • Medicago tuberculata var. syriaca Tod. ex Urb.
  • Medicago tuberculata var. vulgaris Moris
  • Medicago tuberculata var. warburgiana Evenari

and 3 more.

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. USDA PLANTS Database. common name, checklist symbol METU. public domain. 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.