Two-leaf senna
Here’s a native wildflower I’ve never shown you before. That’s surprising, given that it grows in my neighborhood and that on several occasions I’ve shown the other species of senna that grows here. This one is Senna roemeriana, known as two-leaf senna or two-leaved senna. The common name refers to the fact that each of the plant’s leaves is made up of two leaflets; you can see one leaflet and part of its symmetric twin at the lower left in the photograph.
I took this picture beneath the power lines west of Morado Circle one month ago today.
© 2018 Steven Schwartzman
Portraits of Wildflowers 
I like this golden wild beauty!!
Indira
May 17, 2018 at 6:54 AM
You’re probably the first person in the world to call two-leaf senna a golden wild beauty. You’d make a good publicist for our native wildflowers.
Steve Schwartzman
May 17, 2018 at 7:08 AM
With you as their photographer, they all look like beauties. We have a senna somewhere around here but I haven’t gotten around to finding it and drawing it. I actually have always liked sennas.
melissabluefineart
May 17, 2018 at 8:18 AM
Thanks for your photographic vote of confidence. I hope you find your senna soonna rather than lata.
Steve Schwartzman
May 17, 2018 at 9:12 AM
And when Ah do, I shall leave you know.
melissabluefineart
May 19, 2018 at 8:35 AM
Beautiful color!
montucky
May 17, 2018 at 9:21 AM
It is, and viewing it in nature is free. Instead of stop and smell the roses it’s stop and see the senna.
Steve Schwartzman
May 17, 2018 at 9:59 AM
This is really interesting that there’s an endemic Senna from Texas. This is a genus I began to cover ever since I was in PR, however, since I’ve been here in Florida I realize it is rather extensive, so there’s even more fertile ground to explore the ones here. Most flowers seem to have similar traits. The two leaflets is what characterizes this one. Thanks.
Maria
May 17, 2018 at 11:36 AM
As you said, there are lots of species in the United States:
http://bonap.net/Napa/TaxonMaps/Genus/County/Senna
The twin leaflets, as you also noted, are a give-away in identifying Senna roemeriana. It’s not uncommon here, but in my experience Senna lindheimeriana is more common in central Texas.
Steve Schwartzman
May 17, 2018 at 11:48 AM
I should add that I came across yet another species of Senna in the Texas Panhandle four years ago:
https://portraitsofwildflowers.wordpress.com/2014/05/15/dwarf-senna/
Steve Schwartzman
May 17, 2018 at 11:50 AM
These seem like the smallest I’ve seen. The native one here is called Senna mexicana, and there are others too.
Maria
May 17, 2018 at 10:16 PM
For me, too, it was the smallest and lowest Senna species I’ve seen.
I looked up Senna mexicana and found that in the United States it’s native only in Florida.
https://floridanativegarden.wordpress.com/2016/11/14/growing-for-wildlife-is-chapmans-wild-sensitive-plant-senna-ligustrina/
Steve Schwartzman
May 18, 2018 at 7:07 AM
This is lovely. I’ve only seen the Senna lindheimeriana, but I was lucky enough to see both the living plant and one of Lindheimer’s own herbarium sheets featuring “his” senna when the Lindheimer exhibit was at the Sophienburg in New Braunfels. It’s fun that this one bears Roemer’s name. Of all the botanists that traveled Texas in the 1800s, I’d have to say these two are my favorites.
shoreacres
May 18, 2018 at 10:27 PM
I’m glad you mentioned the Sophienburg Museum because I wasn’t aware of it. In fact, even though New Braunfels is little more than an hour away, I’ve rarely spent time in the town.
Somehow I thought of Roemer mainly as a botanist, but the article at
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferdinand_von_Roemer
presents him as a geologist.
The article at
https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fro55
links him to flora and fauna as well as rocks.
Steve Schwartzman
May 18, 2018 at 11:09 PM
Hey, I HAVE seen that one (I think) half way across the continent! A friend grew it from seed from Texas or Oklahoma. I recognize the species name. I do not know what is so special about it; but then, you would not understand what is so important about the seeds I brought back from there either.
tonytomeo
May 19, 2018 at 2:48 PM
Oops. I just looked up the name of the senna that was brought here, and it is not the same.
tonytomeo
May 19, 2018 at 2:51 PM
Yeah, there’s a zillion kinds of Senna in the United States:
http://bonap.net/Napa/TaxonMaps/Genus/County/Senna
Steve Schwartzman
May 19, 2018 at 3:11 PM
I thought that name was familiar.
tonytomeo
May 19, 2018 at 3:13 PM