Lupinus prunophilus

Lupinus prunophilus, commonly known as the hairy bigleaf lupine or chokecherry lupin, is a medium-sized herbaceous plant that grows in the Great Basin and other parts of the U.S. interior between the Sierra-Nevada and the Rockies. It is a close relative and very similar to Lupinus polyphyllus and is considered a subspecies by some botanists.

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Lupinus prunophilus is a herbaceous perennial plant that start the growing season with many leaves on short stalks growing from the base of the plant (basal leaves) and retain these leaves as the much taller flowering stem grows and start to bloom. The multiple flowering stems grow outward and then upward (ascending) reaching 23–65 centimeters tall. David B. Dunn described the stems as either slim or somewhat hollow (somewhat fistulose). The stems are sparsely covered in coarse hairs that stand out straight from the stem surface (spreading-hirsute). Both the basal leaves and the flowering stems arise from a woody caudex. The basal leaves are much more numerous with the 7–30 centimeter long leaf stems (petioles) spreading in every direction to from a rounded tuft of leaves. Each leaf is made up of 8–13 small leaflets, each leaflet is 4–8 centimeters long and rarely less than 10 millimeters wide. The leaflets are flat and much longer than they are wide with the widest portion towards the tip rather than towards the base (oblanceolate). The leaflets are on smaller stalks that are 4–10 centimeters long and attached together at a central point (palmate compound) to the leaf stalk, one of the defining features of genus Lupinus. The leaves are smooth on their upper sides (glabrous) with, at most, only a few hairs on the leaf edges. On the underside they are sparsely covered in fine downy hairs. It has some leaves shorter leaf stalks growing from the flowing stem. The flowering part of each stalk (the raceme) will have 25–68 flowers and be 6–28 centimeters long. Each flower is 10–16 millimeters long and mainly blue-purple in color, but with a cream or yellow "eyespot" on the banner petal. The upper side of the flower is hairless but will a few fine hairs (ciliate) inside the lower lip also called the keel. The seed pods will have 4–6 seeds and each seed is 7–11 millimeters wide.