Tephrosia maxima - Large Tephrosia

Large Tephrosia is an erect or ascending perennial undershrubs up to 1.2 m long; stem often purplish, velvet-hairy. Leaves are imparipinnate, 4-13 cm long; leaflet 9-17, 1-2.4 x 0.5-1 cm, inverted-lanceshaped or obovate-oblong, base pointed to wedge-shaped, tip blunt or flat, apiculate, hairless above, appressed-velvet-hairy beneath, thin-leathery; stipules 4-7 x 2-4 mm, lanceshaped, tapering. Flowers are borne in raceme-like few-flowered clusters in leaf-axils or at branch-ends, up to 14 cm long. Flowers are relatively large, 1.4-1.7 cm long; flower-stalks 2-3 mm long; bracts 4-5 x 1-1.5 mm, ovate to lanceshaped, tapering. Calyx-tube is 2-3 mm long, bell-shaped, velvet-hairy; sepals unequal, 3-6 mm long, lanceshaped, appressed-velvet-hairy. Flower are rose to pinkish white; standard 1.5-1.7 x 1-1.3 cm, obovate; wings 1-1.2 x 0.4-0.6 cm, obovate; keels 1.3-1.5 x 0.4-0.6 cm, oblong, sickle shaped. Pods are 4-6.5 x 0.4-0.6 cm, linear, slightly curved upward toward the tip. Seeds 3-4 mm long, round, dark-brown. Large Tephrosia is found in India, Sri Lanka and East Africa. Flowering: June-September.