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Fabaceae
Purple Prairie Clover
Dalea purpurea
Healing, prairie endurance, quiet beauty.
- Family
- Fabaceae
- Genus
- Dalea
- Native to
- Central North America
- Bloom season
- Summer
- Type
- Perennial
- Height
- 30–90 cm (1–3 ft)
- Sunlight
- Full sun
- Soil
- Dry to medium, well-drained
- Water
- Low
- Hardiness
- 3–8
- Lifespan
- Long-lived perennial
Did you know
- Purple prairie clover is one of the few native North American legumes whose tiny flowers bloom in a rising 'wreath'—a ring of blossoms creeps slowly up each thimble-like spike over weeks.
- Native peoples used the entire plant as both food and medicine—the Ponca chewed the roots like candy, and the Pawnee made a tea for treating measles and pneumonia.
- Like all legumes, prairie clover fixes nitrogen, enriching the impoverished prairie soils where it grows—it's a key 'engineer species' in tallgrass prairie ecosystems.
- The blossoms hum with native bees in midsummer—it's considered one of the top three most productive nectar sources of the entire American tallgrass prairie.
- It is a host plant for the dogface sulphur butterfly—the bright yellow caterpillars feed exclusively on Dalea species in the wild.
Color meanings
0
healing
1
prairie spirit
2
quiet beauty