- Family:
- Fabaceae Lindl.
Lespedeza Michx.

[LOWO]
Legumes of the World. Edited by G. Lewis, B. Schrire, B. MacKinder & M. Lock. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. (2005)
- Note
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The tribe Desmodieae as treated by Ohashi et al. (1981) comprised 27 genera and c. 540 species in three subtribes, the Bryinae, Desmodiinae and Lespedezinae. Molecular analyses by Bailey et al. (1997) and Doyle et al. (2000) show that Bryinae has affinities elsewhere; Lavin et al. (2001a) place it within the Pterocarpus clade of the Dalbergieae sens. lat. (see page 309). The Bryinae are therefore removed from the Desmodieae here, as are two genera formerly placed in subtribe Lespedezinae; Phylacium Benn. and Neocollettia Hemsl., which are moved to tribe Phaseoleae (see page 393) on morphological, palynological and molecular evidence (Doyle et al., 2000; Kajita et al., 2001). The two remaining subtribes of Desmodieae are recognised in this treatment as three groups, the Lespedeza, Phyllodium and Desmodium groups, based on results of an analysis of the chloroplast gene rbcL (Kajita et al., 2001). The Phyllodium and Desmodium groups correspond to subtribe Desmodiinae, and the Lespedeza group to subtribe Lespedezinae (with Campylotropis now comprising 37 instead of 65 species as in Ohashi et al., 1981).
Desmodieae as circumscribed here comprises 30 genera and (524)–527–(530) species (Fig. 48). The tribe occurs in the tropical, subtropical and warm temperate regions of the world, but extends into the cool temperate and sub-boreal regions of E Asia and N America (except W of the Rocky Mountains). At generic level subtribe Desmodiinae is most diverse in tropical S and SE Asia (Dy Phon et al., 1994), while temperate E Asia (Yang & Huang, 1995) and N America (Isely, 1998) are the centres of diversity of subtribe Lespedezinae. The tribe occurs widely from coastal to montane areas, but not at high altitudes. Species are most commonly shrubs or subshrubs, sometimes herbs, rarely trees and are usually erect and 3-foliolate.
The Desmodieae have been considered similar to tribe Phaseoleae (Polhill, 1981a) and were recently shown to be a monophyletic lineage included within Phaseoleae sens. lat. (Fig. 47, page 394), closely related to subtribe Kennediinae (Doyle & Doyle, 1993, Bruneau et al., 1995; Doyle et al., 1997) and possibly sister to Mucuna (Bailey et al., 1997; Doyle et al., 2000; Kajita et al., 2001).
- Vernacular
- bush clovers
- Habit
- Subshrubs, shrubs or herbs
- Ecology
- Temperate to seasonally dry tropical woodland margins, bushland and grassland, in open places
- Distribution
- mainly China and E Asia (c. 25 spp., a few extending to tropical India and Malesia); and N America (c. 12 spp., with about 30 putative natural hybrids); subgen. Macrolespedeza (c. 12 spp.) is confined in E Asia with the centre of diversity in Japan and Korea
[LOWO]
- Use
- Bush clovers are used as green manure and cover crops, highly esteemed forage crops, human food and drink (i.e., as an alternative to tea, e.g., L. bicolor Turcz.), and as bee-food; also grown as ornamentals, e.g. L. thunbergii (DC.) Nakai; L. juncea (L.f.) Pers. var. sericea (Thunb.) Lace & Hemsl. (sericea lespedeza or Chinese bush clover) is a noxious weed in USA
Doubtfully present in:
Hainan
Native to:
Afghanistan, Alabama, Amur, Arkansas, Assam, Buryatiya, Cambodia, China North-Central, China South-Central, China Southeast, Chita, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, East Himalaya, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, India, Indiana, Inner Mongolia, Iowa, Irkutsk, Japan, Jawa, Kansas, Kentucky, Khabarovsk, Korea, Kuril Is., Laos, Lesser Sunda Is., Louisiana, Maine, Malaya, Manchuria, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mexico Northeast, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nansei-shoto, Nebraska, Nepal, New Guinea, New Jersey, New South Wales, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pakistan, Pennsylvania, Philippines, Primorye, Qinghai, Queensland, Rhode I., Sakhalin, South Carolina, Sumatera, Taiwan, Tennessee, Texas, Thailand, Tibet, Vermont, Victoria, Vietnam, Virginia, West Himalaya, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Xinjiang
Introduced into:
Arizona, Baltic States, Belarus, Central European Rus, Dominican Republic, East European Russia, Hawaii, Kirgizstan, KwaZulu-Natal, Northern Provinces, Transcaucasus, Ukraine, Uzbekistan
- Lespedeza × acuticarpa Mack. & Bush
- Lespedeza angustifolia (Pursh) Elliott
- Lespedeza × bicoloba S.Akiyama
- Lespedeza bicolor Turcz.
- Lespedeza × brittonii E.P.Bicknell
- Lespedeza buergeri Miq.
- Lespedeza cambodianum V.D.Nguyen
- Lespedeza capitata Michx.
- Lespedeza caraganae Bunge
- Lespedeza chinensis G.Don
- Lespedeza cuneata (Dum.Cours.) G.Don
- Lespedeza cyrtobotrya Miq.
- Lespedeza × cyrtobuergeri S.Akiyama & H.Ohba
- Lespedeza × cyrtoloba S.Akiyama
- Lespedeza daurica (Laxm.) Schindl.
- Lespedeza davidii Franch.
- Lespedeza dunnii Schindl.
- Lespedeza elegans Cambess.
- Lespedeza fasciculiflora Franch.
- Lespedeza floribunda Bunge
- Lespedeza fordii Schindl.
- Lespedeza forrestii Schindl.
- Lespedeza gerardiana Wall. ex Maxim.
- Lespedeza hengduanshanensis (C.J.Chen) Bo Xu, X.F.Gao & Li Bing Zhang
- Lespedeza hirta (L.) Hornem.
- Lespedeza hisauchii T.Nemoto & H.Ohashi
- Lespedeza hispida (Franch.) T.Nemoto & H.Ohashi
- Lespedeza homoloba Nakai
- Lespedeza inschanica (Maxim.) Schindl.
- Lespedeza × intermixta Makino
- Lespedeza jiangxiensis Bo Xu, X.F.Gao & Li Bing Zhang
- Lespedeza juncea (L.f.) Pers.
- Lespedeza × kagoshimensis Hatus.
- Lespedeza leptostachya Engelm. ex A.Gray
- Lespedeza lichiyuniae T.Nemoto, H.Ohashi & T.Itoh
- Lespedeza × longifolia DC.
- Lespedeza × macrovirgata Kitag.
- Lespedeza × manniana Mack. & Bush
- Lespedeza maritima Nakai
- Lespedeza maximowiczii C.K.Schneid.
- Lespedeza melanantha Nakai
- Lespedeza × miquelii S.Akiyama
- Lespedeza × neglecta (Britton) Mack. & Bush
- Lespedeza × nuttallii Darl.
- Lespedeza × oblongifolia (Britton) W.Stone
- Lespedeza pilosa (Thunb.) Siebold & Zucc.
- Lespedeza procumbens Michx.
- Lespedeza pseudomaximowiczii D.P.Jin, Bo Xu & B.H.Choi
- Lespedeza repens (L.) W.P.C.Barton
- Lespedeza × robusta Nakai
- Lespedeza sessilifolia Gamble
- Lespedeza × simulata Mack. & Bush
- Lespedeza stuevei Nutt.
- Lespedeza texana Britton
- Lespedeza thunbergii (DC.) Nakai
- Lespedeza tomentosa (Thunb.) Siebold ex Maxim.
- Lespedeza violacea Pers.
- Lespedeza virgata (Thunb.) DC.
- Lespedeza virginica (L.) Britton
Lespedeza Michx. appears in other Kew resources:
First published in Fl. Bor.-Amer. 2: 70 (1803)
Accepted by
- Ohashi, H., Nemoto, T. & Ohashi, K. (2009). A revision of Lespedeza subgenus Lepspedeza (Leguminosae) of China The Journal of Japanese Botany 84: 143-166.
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Kew Backbone Distributions
The International Plant Names Index and World Checklist of Selected Plant Families 2022. Published on the Internet at http://www.ipni.org and http://apps.kew.org/wcsp/
© Copyright 2017 World Checklist of Selected Plant Families. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0
-
Kew Names and Taxonomic Backbone
The International Plant Names Index and World Checklist of Selected Plant Families 2022. Published on the Internet at http://www.ipni.org and http://apps.kew.org/wcsp/
© Copyright 2017 International Plant Names Index and World Checklist of Selected Plant Families. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0
-
Legumes of the World Online
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0