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Lespedeza
Also called Bush Clover
Lespedeza is a genus of about 45 shrubs and trailing vines in the pea family, known as bush clovers. Commonly grown garden members are hardy, deciduous shrubs valued for their arching stems and pea-like flowers, and they are easy to grow in sunny, well-drained spots.
Lespedeza is a genus of some 45 species (including nothospecies) of flowering plants in the pea family (Fabaceae), commonly known as bush clovers or (particularly East Asian species) Japanese clovers (hagi). The genus is native to warm temperate to subtropical regions of eastern North America, eastern and southern Asia and Australasia.
These shrubby plants or trailing vines belong to the "typical" legumes (Faboideae), with the peas and beans, though they are part of another tribe, the Desmodieae. Therein, they are treated as type genus of the smaller subtribe Lespedezinae, which unites the present genus and its presumed closest relatives, Campylotropis and Kummerowia.
Some species are grown as garden or ornamental plants, and are used as a forage crops, notably in the southern United States, and as a means of soil enrichment and for prevention of erosion. In some areas, certain species are invasive. Lespedeza, like other legumes, have root nodules that harbor bacteria capable of nitrogen fixation from the air into a soil-bound form that can be taken up by other plants. Growers can take advantage of this process by putting the plants in their fields to release nitrogen, so they can use less fertilizer.
L. bicolor leaves and roots contain l-methoxy-N,N-dimethyltryptamine (lespedamine), as well as related Nω,Nω-dimethyltryptamines and their oxides, as well as some bufotenin.
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Lespedeza by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
