Dalea feayi (Samuel Dale was an 18^th Century British naturalist. William Feay, 1804-1879, was an American botanist active in Florida.)

Fabaceae (Legume Family)

This week John and I visited a favorite (literally) hot spot, Seabranch State Park near Hobe Sound, FL, sun-cooked white sand scrub,  mostly to see Bluecurls, Trichostema dichotomum. Our curiosity was inspired by recent research by North Carolina botanist Kevan McClelland.  As intriguing as that species is, its interpretation belongs to Kevan, not to blog writers.    We also saw our old arachnophilia friend, the Red Widow Spider, always a thrill.  

The June rains have given the scrub a shot in the arm,  as evidenced by delicate white Clammyweed flowers,  parasitic Black Senna and Golden Chrysopsis rising fast, Palafox in bloom,  and winning “best in show,” Feay’s Prairie-Clover blossoming like there’s no tomorrow.  It is amazing that such a showy species is nearly un-studied except for its classification and fire recovery.  It is tough to be an instant Google-expert on this one.

The flowers do not look at all like Legume flowers they are. It is in the “pea and bean” subfamily of Legumes, but good luck seeing why!   Pea-type flowers are kinda exclusive with respect to pollinators, but in Dalea they seem to have lost their specialization and accommodate all comers.  The flowers are in globe-shaped heads resembling the Aster Family, and even more similar to those of Buttonbush in the Coffee Family.   It is a “get-pollinated a lot now” machine.   They may need to draw every pollinator around when they can before heat, drought, blazing sun, or fire spoil the party.   We have seen, and seen reported by others, almost every sort of pollinator you might imagine on Prairie-Clover:  bees of many species, butterflies, moths, and wasps.  When the flowers are clustered in a head, one visitor probably services many flowers.  Each makes a tiny little seedlike pod to flutter off into the sandy seed bank for the next time it is rainy and favorable.

Mature individuals can return from a licking.   They can regrow from a thick root after bad events.  The root is orange, which make you wonder why…probably protective toxins.   “Blister glands” on the leaves and stem likewise say pick your poison.  What’s up with that?

If we can extrapolate from other Dalea species, they show a commonsense feature I’ve never seen documented, probably out of sheer ignorance.  They have a differential distribution of antibiotics, with antibacterials in the roots, and chemicals that suppress lepidopteran caterpillars in the leaves.  That’s a good thing for caterpillars able to tolerate the toxins, maybe even sequester them.   The Southern Dogface Butterfly uses various Dalea species as a larval hostplant. This yellow butterfly, with its southern limit in or near Martin or Palm Beach County belongs to the family of Sulphur Butterflies, which often use Legumes as larval hosts. (It is call “dogface” due to a dark blotch on the wings that may look like Fido if you want it to.)