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Leguminosae
Synonyms
Hedysarum scorpiurus Desv.
Description
A straggling, climbing or procumbent herb with small blue flowers.
Terminal leaflet about 2 cm long and 1 cm broad, rounded at each end, thinly
pubescent. Racemes up to 10 cm long, few-flowered. Flowers 4 mm long. Pod
five- to eight-seeded, segments twice as long as broad, not deeply indented.
Distribution
Originated in tropical America, now widespread in the tropics.
It grows naturally at Townsville in north Queensland.
Characteristics
A vigorous, widely adaptable legume, it spreads quickly because
its pods adhere to animals. Forms a good mixture with short grasses such
as Axonopus and Paspalum and with other legumes. It stands treading and
is very palatable. Its protein content is recorded by Bermudez et al. (1968)
as 19.3 percent. In Nigeria, Miller and Rains (1963) found the dry-matter
intake per head per day by cattle was 0.42 kg. The plant contained 90.3
percent organic matter, of which 44.7 percent was digestible, 15.5 percent
crude protein of which 7.7 percent was digestible, and 29.3 percent crude
fibre.
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