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False Indigos
Amorpha
Amorpha is a genus of plants in the pea family, Fabaceae. All the species are native to North America, from southern Canada, most of the United States (US), and northern Mexico. They are commonly known as false indigo. The name Amorpha means "deformed" or "without form" in Greek and was given because flowers of this genus only have one petal, unlike the usual "pea-shaped" flowers of the Faboideae subfamily. Amorpha is missing the wing and keel petals.
The desert false indigo or indigo bush (Amorpha fruticosa), is a shrub that grows from 3 m to 5 m tall. The species is considered a rare species in the US state of West Virginia and in the Canadian provinces of Manitoba and Ontario, but is considered an invasive plant in some areas of the northeastern and northwestern United States and in southeastern Canada, beyond its native range, and has also been introduced into Europe.
16 branches of this genus, most-observed first

false indigo bush
speciesAmorpha fruticosa

leadplant
speciesAmorpha canescens

California False Indigo
speciesAmorpha californica

Clusterspike False Indigo
speciesAmorpha herbacea

Fragrant Indigobush
speciesAmorpha nana

Panicled False Indigo
speciesAmorpha paniculata

Mountain False Indigo
speciesAmorpha glabra

Ouachita False Indigo
speciesAmorpha ouachitensis

Shining False Indigo
speciesAmorpha nitens

Carolina lead-plant
speciesAmorpha confusa

Texas amorpha
speciesAmorpha roemeriana
Schwerin's False Indigo
speciesAmorpha schwerinii

Georgia False Indigo
speciesAmorpha georgiana

Smooth False Indigo
speciesAmorpha laevigata

Baja California false indigo
speciesAmorpha apiculata
hybrid false indigo
hybridAmorpha × notha
Where it lives
Recorded sightings
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geo-referenced records in GBIF, from museums, herbaria and field observers.
Drag the globe to turn it. Dots are where records exist, not a range map; darker means more records.
In the old herbals & bestiaries
In the stacks
Searching the stacks…
Every page naming Amorpha in the Biodiversity Heritage Library →
This page is assembled live from iNaturalist, GBIF, Wikipedia, the Source Library and the Internet Archive. It is not yet part of the hand-edited codex. iNaturalist taxon 57357.
