Dermatophyllum secundiflorum

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Dermatophyllum secundiflorum
Calia secundiflora flowers.jpg
Dermatophyllum secundiflorum flowers and leaves
Scientific classification OOjs UI icon edit-ltr.svg
Kingdom: Plantae
Clade: Tracheophytes
Clade: Angiosperms
Clade: Eudicots
Clade: Rosids
Order: Fabales
Family: Fabaceae
Subfamily: Faboideae
Genus: Dermatophyllum
Species:
D. secundiflorum
Binomial name
Dermatophyllum secundiflorum
(Ortega) Gandhi & Reveal
Calia secundiflora range map.png
Natural range
Synonyms [1]
  • Broussonetia secundifloraOrtega
  • Calia erythrospermaTerán & Berland.
  • Calia secundiflora(Ortega) Yakovlev
  • Calia secundiflora f. xanthosperma(Rehder) Yakovlev
  • Calia secundiflora subsp. albofoliolataYakovlev
  • Cladrastis secundiflora(Ortega) Raf.
  • Dermatophyllum speciosumScheele
  • Sophora secundiflora(Ortega) Lag. ex DC.
  • Sophora secundiflora f. xanthospermaRehder
  • Sophora speciosa(Scheele) Benth.
  • Virgilia secundiflora(Ortega) Cav.
A specimen of Dermatophyllum secundiflorum in its fruiting stage. Texas mountain laurel fruiting stage.jpg
A specimen of Dermatophyllum secundiflorum in its fruiting stage.

Dermatophyllum secundiflorum is a species of flowering shrub or small tree in the family Fabaceae [2] that is native to the Southwestern United States (Texas, New Mexico) and Mexico (Chihuahua and Coahuila south to Hidalgo, Puebla, and Querétaro). [3] Its common names include Texas mountain laurel, Texas mescalbean, frijolito, and frijolillo. [2]

Contents

Name

Although "mescalbean" is among the plant's common monikers, it bears no relation to the Agave species used to make the spirit mezcal, nor to the peyote cactus (Lophophora williamsii), which contains the hallucinogenic alkaloid mescaline. [4] The common name "Texas mountain laurel" is also misleading, as it is unrelated to true mountain laurel. [5]

Description

An evergreen, its leaves are pinnately compound, with small, roughly spatulate leaflets; the leaflets are rather thick, and waxy to the touch. Never tall, and rarely having a straight trunk, its bark is smooth in all but the oldest specimens. [6] It grows slowly to a height of 15 ft (4.6 m) and a crown diameter of 10 ft (3.0 m). [7]

Extremely fragrant purple flowers, resembling the smell of grape soda, are produced in large clusters in March and April. [8] They are followed by 4 in (10 cm) pods containing deep orange seeds. [7]

Habitat

It is well-adapted to arid and semiarid habitats, but is most common in riparian zones. [2]

Uses

D. secundiflorum is a popular ornamental plant due to its showy flowers and orange seeds. The reddish wood it produces is potentially useful, but as yet has little commercial value.

The beans were once used by some Native American tribes as a recreational drug, before being supplanted by peyote. This plant is psychoactive but is also extremely toxic due to the presence of the bicyclic alkaloid cytisine, which is chemically related to nicotine. [8] The consumption of a single seed is enough to kill an adult. [9]

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<i>Erythrina herbacea</i> Species of legume

Erythrina herbacea, commonly known as the coral bean, Cherokee bean, Mamou plant in South Louisiana, red cardinal or cardinal spear, is a flowering shrub or small tree found throughout the southeastern United States and northeastern Mexico; it has also been reported from parts of Central America and, as an introduced species, from Pakistan. Various other systematic names have been used for this plant in the past, including Erythrina arborea, Erythrina hederifolia, Erythrina humilis, Erythrina rubicunda, Corallodendron herbaceum and Xyphanthus hederifolius.

<i>Styphnolobium</i> Genus of legumes

Styphnolobium is a genus of flowering plants in the pea family, Fabaceae. It includes nine species of small trees and shrubs native to China and to the Americas, from the southern United States to Colombia. It belongs to subfamily Faboideae, and was formerly included within a broader interpretation of the genus Sophora. It was recently assigned to the unranked, monophyletic Cladrastis clade. They differ from the genus Calia (mescalbeans) in having deciduous leaves and flowers in axillary, not terminal, racemes. The leaves are pinnate, with 9–21 leaflets, and the flowers in pendulous racemes similar to those of the black locust. Necklacepod is a common name for plants in this genus.

<i>Sophora</i> Genus of plants

Sophora is a genus of about 45 species of small trees and shrubs in the pea family Fabaceae. The species have a pantropical distribution. The generic name is derived from sophera, an Arabic name for a pea-flowered tree.

<i>Parkinsonia aculeata</i> Species of legume

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<i>Mimosa tenuiflora</i> Species of plant

Mimosa tenuiflora, syn. Mimosa hostilis, also known as jurema preta, calumbi (Brazil), tepezcohuite (México), carbonal, cabrera, jurema, black jurema, and binho de jurema, is a perennial tree or shrub native to the northeastern region of Brazil and found as far north as southern Mexico, and the following countries: El Salvador, Honduras, Panama, Colombia and Venezuela. It is most often found in lower altitudes, but it can be found as high as 1,000 m (3,300 ft).

<i>Robinia neomexicana</i> Plant species in the pea family

Robinia neomexicana, the New Mexican, New Mexico, Southwest, desert, pink, or rose locust, is a shrub or small tree in the subfamily Faboideae of the family Fabaceae.

<i>Dermatophyllum</i> Genus of plants

Dermatophyllum/Sophora secundiflora is a genus of three or four species of shrubs and small trees in the family Fabaceae. The genus is native to southwestern North America from western Texas to New Mexico and Arizona in the United States, and south through Chihuahua, Coahuila, and Nuevo León in northern Mexico. Members of the genus are commonly known as mescalbean, mescal bean, or frijolito. One of the common names of Dermatophyllum secundiflorum is Texas mountain laurel, although the name mountain laurel also refers to the very dissimilar and unrelated genus Kalmia and the name laurel refers generally to plants in the unrelated order Laurales. Dermatophyllum secundiflorum is one of the most abundant woody species in the Texas Hill Country or Edwards Plateau.

<i>Castanospermum</i> Genus of legumes

Castanospermum is a monotypic genus in the legume family Fabaceae. The sole species is Castanospermum australe, commonly known as Moreton Bay chestnut or black bean, which is native to rainforested areas on the east coast of Queensland and northeastern New South Wales, and to the southwest Pacific islands of Vanuatu and New Caledonia

<i>Albizia julibrissin</i> Species of plant

Albizia julibrissin, the Persian silk tree, pink silk tree, or mimosa tree, is a species of tree in the Fabaceae family, native to southwestern and eastern Asia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cytisine</span> Chemical compound

Cytisine, also known as baptitoxine, cytisinicline, or sophorine, is an alkaloid that occurs naturally in several plant genera, such as Laburnum and Cytisus of the family Fabaceae. It has been used medically to help with smoking cessation. It has been found effective in several randomized clinical trials, including in the United States and New Zealand, and is being investigated in additional trials in the United States and a non-inferiority trial in Australia in which it is being compared head-to-head with the smoking cessation aid varenicline. It has also been used entheogenically via mescalbeans by some Native American groups, historically in the Rio Grande Valley predating even peyote.

<i>Sophora chrysophylla</i> Species of plant

Sophora chrysophylla, known as māmane in Hawaiian, is a species of flowering plant in the pea and bean family, Fabaceae, that is endemic to Hawaii. It is highly polymorphic, growing as a shrub or tree, and able to reach a height of 15 m (49 ft) in tree form. Yellow flowers are produced in winter and spring.

<i>Styphnolobium japonicum</i> Species of legume

Styphnolobium japonicum, the Japanese pagoda tree is a species of deciduous tree in the subfamily Faboideae of the pea family Fabaceae.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peyote</span> Species of plant

The peyote is a small, spineless cactus which contains psychoactive alkaloids, particularly mescaline. Peyote is a Spanish word derived from the Nahuatl peyōtl, meaning "caterpillar cocoon", from a root peyōni, "to glisten". Peyote is native to Mexico and southwestern Texas. It is found primarily in the Sierra Madre Occidental, the Chihuahuan Desert and in the states of Nayarit, Coahuila, Nuevo León, Tamaulipas, and San Luis Potosí among scrub. It flowers from March to May, and sometimes as late as September. The flowers are pink, with thigmotactic anthers.

<i>Canavalia rosea</i> Species of legume

Canavalia rosea is a species of flowering plant of the genus Canavalia in the pea family of Fabaceae, it has a pantropical and subtropical distribution in upper beaches, cliffs, and dunes. Common names include beach bean, bay bean, sea bean, greater sea bean, seaside jack-bean, coastal jack-bean, and MacKenzie bean.

<i>Erythrostemon mexicanus</i> Species of legume

Erythrostemon mexicanus, formerly Caesalpinia mexicana, is a species of plant in the genus Erythrostemon, within the pea family, Fabaceae. Common names include Mexican holdback, Mexican caesalpinia, and tabachín del monte. It is native to the extreme lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas and to parts of Mexico: in the northeast and further south along the Gulf coast as well as the Pacific coast in Nayarit, Jalisco, Colima, and a small portion of Sinaloa.

<i>Ebenopsis ebano</i> Species of legume

Ebenopsis ebano is a species of flowering plant in the family Fabaceae, that is native to the coastal plain of southern Texas in the United States and eastern Mexico. It is commonly known as Texas ebony or ebano.

<i>Sophora tomentosa</i> Species of plant

Sophora tomentosa, also known as necklacepod, yellow necklacepod, and occasionally as silver bush, is a pantropical shrub or small tree in the family Fabaceae. It commonly ranges in height from 4 to 10 feet and often occurs in coastal conditions and near wetlands. The common name Necklacepod is derived from the characteristic string of seed pods that develop after its yellow flowers germinate into seeds.

<i>Dermatophyllum gypsophilum</i> Species of legume

Dermatophyllum gypsophilum is a rare species of flowering plant in the legume family known by the common names Guadalupe Mountain necklacepod, Guadalupe mescalbean, and gypsum necklace. It is native to New Mexico and Texas in the United States, and it is known from one location in Chihuahua in Mexico.

References

  1. Gandhi KN, Vincent MA, Reveal JL (2011). "Dermatophyllum, the correct name for Calia (Fabaceae)" (PDF). Phytoneuron . 57: 1–4.
  2. 1 2 3 Uchytil, Ronald J. (1990). "Sophora secundiflora". Fire Effects Information System. United States Forest Service. Retrieved 2009-12-29.
  3. "Calia secundiflora". Germplasm Resources Information Network . Agricultural Research Service, United States Department of Agriculture . Retrieved 2009-12-29.
  4. "Mescal Bean & The Unrelated Peyote Cactus". Plants That Make You Loco. Wayne's World. Archived from the original on 2010-01-14. Retrieved 2009-12-29.
  5. "Mescalbean". Texas A&M Forest Service. Retrieved 2024-01-16.
  6. "Sophora secundiflora Texas mountain laurel". Arid Plant List. Pima County Home Horticulture. 2004-05-16. Archived from the original on 2010-02-28. Retrieved 2009-12-29.
  7. 1 2 Mielke, Judy (1993). Native Plants for Southwestern Landscapes. University of Texas Press. p. 258. ISBN   978-0-292-75147-7.
  8. 1 2 "Arboretum Spotlight: Smell the grape soda". The Sacramento Bee. ISSN   0890-5738 . Retrieved 2019-05-14.
  9. Little, Elbert L. (1994) [1980]. The Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Trees: Western Region (Chanticleer Press ed.). Knopf. p. 506. ISBN   0394507614.