Flora of New Zealand Series

sweet pea

Scrambling annual; stems moderately hairy, angled, winged. Lvs sparsely to moderately hairy; tendril branched; leaflets in 1 pair, ovate to elliptic, acute, 25-60 mm long; veins only weakly or not parallel; stipules ovate-lanceolate with 1 basal lobe, > 1/2 as wide as stem, 8-20 mm long. Infl. much > lvs, 1-3-flowered; pedicels 6-8 mm long. Calyx hairy, slightly gibbous at base; calyx teeth ± equal, triangular, ± = or > tube. Corolla mauve to purple, pink to deep red, blue or white, 25-35 mm long. Pod densely hairy, light brown, 4-10-seeded, 50-70 mm long; seeds reddish brown, finely reticulate-rugose; hilum c. ⅙ of circumference.

N.: Burgess Id (Hauraki Gulf), vicinity of Gisborne City, Wellington City and coastal W. Wellington Province N. to Levin; S.: Blenheim, Kaiapoi, vicinity of Christchurch, Washdyke, Alexandra.

Italy, Sicilia 1870

Usually occurring in waste places only as a casual garden escape, but more established on dry hill slopes near Alexandra.

FL Nov-May.

Sweet pea is widely cultivated as an ornamental. Ball, P. W., in Fl. Europ. 2 (1968), described the seeds as smooth with hilum 1/4 of the circumference. Seeds of naturalised N.Z. material are reticulate-rugose with a hilum of ⅙; commercial seed in N.Z. is somewhat smoother, greyer in colour, again with the hilum ⅙ of the circumference.