Beaver Indian Breadroot

Pediomelum castoreum (S. Wats.) Rydberg
Psoralea castorea S. Wats. (; E. Palmer, Am. Nat. 12: 601; hyponym. 1878) Proc. Am. Acad. 14:
291. 1879. Lolodes castoreum Kuntze, Rev. Gen. 194. 1891.
A perennial, with a fusiform, farinaceous, tuberous root 5-8 cm. long, 1-3 cm. thick; stem very short, less than 1 dm. high, strigose-canescent, sometimes with decumbent branches 1 dm. long or more; leaves digitately 3-5-foliolate; stipules membranous, ovate, acute, 1 cm. long; petioles 5-10 cm. long; leaflets cuneate-obovate, rounded, acute, or even retuse at the apex, strigose-canescent beneath, sparingly strigose above, 2-4 cm. long; peduncles 3-5 cm. long; spikes dense, 2-4 cm. long; bracts ovate, lanceolate, or oblong, acute or obtuse, 5 mm. long or less; calyx canescent-strigose; tube 2 mm. long; upper four lobes subulate, attenuate, 7-8 mm. long, the lowest one spatulate or obovate, rounded or obtuse at the apex, about 10 mm. long; corolla blue, fully 1 cm. long; banner oblong; body of the pod ovoid, 8 mm. long, the flat attenuate beak 14-15 mm. long; seed 7 mm. long, flattened, transversely wrinkled, lightbrown.
Type locality: Near Beaver City, Utah [according to Watson, but Palmer, loc. cit., gives the locality as "between Beaver Dam, Arizona, and Saint Thomas, Nevada."].
Distribution: Southern Utah and Nevada, Arizona, and southern California.