Yellow Sweetclover, Melilotus officinalis
Family: Fabaceae; Bean Family
Vegetative Characteristics:
Seedling: cotyledons oblong; first true leaf simple, remaining leaves compound
Stems: erect, 0.2-2.0 m tall, branching, green, glabrous to slightly pubescent apically
Leaves: alternate, compound, pinnately trifoliate; leaflets 1.0-2.5 cm long, 5.0-20.0 mm wide, oblanceolate to obovate, margins minutely serrate; stipules fused toward base
Reproductive Characteristics:
Inflorescences: in slender, elongate raceme at least four to eight times as long as wide, flowers 35-75 per raceme; sepals papilionaceous, green; petals 3.0-5.0 mm long, white or yellow; stamens 10, united
Fruits: legume, 1.8-3.4 mm long and wide, globose, nearly indehiscent, very short-stalked, usually dark brown to blackish at maturity, 1-seeded, glabrous, reticulate-veined, calyx not inflated below pod
Seeds: yellowish or greenish yellow, not mottled, one side flat, the other smoothly rounded
Special Identifying Characteristics:
⇒ erect annual or occasionally biennial; flowers white or yellow; pod covered with network of coarse nerves; seed not mottled
