Astragalus gombo Coss. & Durieu ex Bunge
A. fruticosus subsp. gombo (Bunge) Jafri, A. fruticosus auct. Flora of Libya
Eng.: Milkvetch. Fre.: Astragale. Ara.: Gelga, ful el hamir, djelban el hamir, fegguce ed duab, meroqba, neqlene, fuliya. Tamahaq: ekechker, akassaker.
Perennial herbaceous plant that up to 1 m in height or more, with little or no woody stems, not spiny, highly branched, erect or procumbent, white-tomentose. It has very large leaves, up to 30 cm, with 20-30 pairs of leaflets, broadly ovate or orbicular-chordate, hairy on the adaxial surface and pubescent whitish on the underside. Flowers in axillary clusters of 3-4, with short peduncle and pedicel of 1-2 mm. Velvety membranous calyx, 1-1.2 cm, with lanceolate teeth equal in length to the tube. Corolla 2-3 cm, papilionoid, of an intense yellow color. Androecium diadelphous. Ovary sessile. Pod 2.5-6.5 × 1-1.5 cm, slightly arched, non-woody, longitudinally venose, reticulated, tomentose white or brown, ending in a short beak (0.5-0.7 cm), with 10-30 seeds. Seeds less than 3 mm, reniform, brown.
Flowering:
March-June or, more generally after the rains.
Fruiting:
June-September, generally one month after flowering.
Habitat:
Sandy desert areas, dunes.
Distribution:
Relatively common endemism of the dunes of the northern Sahara. It appears in Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya.
Observations:
There are 2 recognised subspecies: A. gombo subsp. gombo, with pods 4.5-6.5 cm long, known from Morocco and Western Algeria; and A. gombo subsp. gomboëformis (Pomel) Eug.Ott (A. gomboeformis Pomel), smaller in size and with smaller flowers and pods, pods 2.5-3 cm, with thick and spongy walls and shorter beak, from Eastern Algeria, Tunisia and Libya.
A. gombo subsp. pseudogombo (Fernandez Casas) Romo, cited in Morocco, seems to be synonymous of A. maurorum Murb.
Conservation status:
Rare but widely distributed species, in principle it is not considered threatened. Currently, it has not been assessed at a global level in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.