FLORA OF NORTH AMERICA LEGUME VOLUME

Compiled by Tammy Charron Flora of North America Managing Editor, Missouri Botanical Garden

The legume volume of Flora of North America North of Mexico Volume 11: Magnoliophyta: Fabaceae, parts 1 and 2 is scheduled for publication by Oxford University Press on 23rd March 2023. The product of a large collaboration involving an international team of experts, this is the first comprehensive treatment of the legumes of North America north of Mexico to reflect the extensive changes to classification resulting from recent research and current understanding of the diversity and distribution of the family. It includes treatments prepared by 70 authors covering 1,345 species in 153 genera. All legume genera, native and naturalized, are treated, including Astragalus, the largest genus in the world, with 350+ species in the Flora. Descriptions for all genera, species, and recognized infraspecific taxa are provided, as are occurrence maps for all species and infraspecifics. Every genus and 15% of the species are illustrated. Identification keys are included for taxa at all ranks.

One of the plates of botanical illustrations from the legume volume of Flora of North America, drawn by Yevonn Wilson Ramsey, courtesy of the Flora of North America Association.

This volume was edited by James L. Zarucchi†, Lead Editor to 2019, Geoffrey A. Levin, Lead Editor (2019–2021), Michael A. Vincent, Lead Taxon Editor for Fabaceae, David E. Boufford, Thomas G. Lammers, and Jay A. Raveill, Assisting Editors for Fabaceae, Kanchi Gandhi, Nomenclatural and Etymological Editor, Robert W. Kiger, Bibliographic Editor, John L. Strother, Reviewing Editor, and Martha J. Hill, Senior Technical Editor.

The legume volume of FNA is dedicated to Jim Zarucchi, a prominent legume systematist who worked at the Missouri Botanical Garden from 1984 to 2019. Jim was heavily involved in the FNA project, serving as Editorial Director of FNA and as lead editor of Volume 10, Magnoliophyta: Proteaceae to Elaeagnaceae and Volume 11, Magnoliophyta: Fabaceae, until his untimely death in 2019. A tribute to Jim was published in the Bean Bag, Issue 67 in 2020.

Volume 11 is the twenty-third volume to be published in the planned 30-volume Flora of North America North of Mexico (FNA) series, which presents for the first time, in one published reference source, information on the names, taxonomic relationships, continent-wide distributions, and morphological characteristics of all plants native and naturalized in North America north of Mexico. FNA Volume 11 will be available to purchase at http://global.oup.com/academic/content/series/f/flora-of-north-america-fna/.

A selection of legumes of North America, left to right, top to bottom: Apios americana (photo Anne Bruneau), Astragalus mollissimus var. mogollonicus (photo Marty Wojciechowski), Pediomelum esculentum (photo Matt Lavin), Leucaena retusa (photo Colin Hughes); Robinia neomexicana (photo Marty Wojciechowski); Lupinus nootkatensis (photo Colin Hughes).