| Anthyllis vulneraria | |
|---|---|
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| (unranked): | Angiosperms |
| (unranked): | Eudicots |
| (unranked): | Rosids |
| Order: | Fabales |
| Family: | Fabaceae |
| Genus: | Anthyllis |
| Species: | A. vulneraria |
| Binomial name | |
| Anthyllis vulneraria L. |
|
Anthyllis vulneraria [1] (Common kidneyvetch, Kidney vetch, woundwort) is a medicinal plant[2] native to Europe. The name vulneraria means "wound healer".
Contents |
Anthyllis vulneraria reaches 5–40 centimetres (2.0–16 in) of height. The stem is simple or more often branched. The leaves are imparipinnate, glabrous or with scattered hairs on the upper face and silky hairs on the underside.
The flower heads are spherical in shape and 10–20 millimetres (0.39–0.79 in) long. The flower are yellow in almost all sub-species, with the typical irregular shape of the flowers of legumes. Flowering takes place between June and September. The fruit is a legume. The fruits ripening takes place from July to October.
Kidney vetch is the foodplant of the small blue butterfly larvae.
This plant is spontaneous in the entire Europe, from Iceland to the Mediterranean, in Asia Minor up to Iran, in North Africa and in Ethiopia. It is naturalized in North America. It prefers the dry grasslands and rocky environments with calcareous soil, up to 3000 m of altitude.
This species includes numerous subspecies (which some authors elevate to the role of separate species). An incomplete list is as follows: