Often forming large clumps 1–3-feet tall and wide, this prairie-clover blooms on 1–2-foot tall, hairless stems with a round to cylindric spike of tiny, white flowers. Note the spike has few or no hairs, the petals are all similar,  and the flowers bloom from the bottom upward.

FLOWERS: May–September. Dense spikes on branch tips with 1/4-inch long (6 mm) white flowers, 5 similar petals, 5 stamens, 5 showy yellow anthers; blooms in a ring around the spike that advances up to the apex. The 1/8-inch long (3 mm) pod doesn’t split open when dried.

LEAVES: Alternate. Blade odd-pinnate, with 5–9 linear to oblong leaflets, each 3/8–1 1/4-inches long (1–3 cm), bottom surface gland-dotted (use lens).

HABITAT: Clay, sandy, gravelly soils, roadsides, disturbed areas; grasslands, pinyon-juniper, ponderosa-oak woodlands.

ELEVATION: 4,000–9,000 feet.

RANGE: Widespread, central U. S. from AZ to GA.

SIMILAR SPECIES: About 30 species of Dalea in NM, some shrubby. Sandsage Prairie-Clover, D. cylindriceps, scattered statewide, also has hairless leaves and 5 stamens but the flower spike reaches 1–7-inches long (2.5–18 cm). White Dalea, D. albiflora in sw NM has a hairy spike of white flowers with 10 stamens and leaves with 19–31 very hairy leaflets.

NM COUNTIES: Statewide in low- to mid-elevation habitats.