Home » Explore Brooklyn Botanic Garden » Garden Stroll
Plant Family Collection: Legumes
Closely related to the roses are the legumes. The fruits of this group of plants are pods, the most familiar of which are found in the pea, the bean, and the honey locust tree.
Legumes as well as roses usually have compound leaves (leaves made up of leaflets) and stipules (appendages found toward the stem end of the leaf stalks). In the best-known legumes (the pea, for example), the flowers are quite distinctive—asymmetrical, an advanced feature—with a large petal above called a standard, two lateral petals called wings, and two petals below that are fused together called a keel. This distinct flower structure is adapted specifically for insect pollination—in fact, the flowers of some legumes are tailor-made for a single insect species.
Some notable examples of legumes in the Plant Family Collection are pagoda tree (Sophora japonica) and Japanese wisteria (Wisteria floribunda).
Map of the Garden
The Plant Family Collection is indicated by the orange box. Click on the map to visit other locations in the Garden, or click here to view a larger map.
