Swainsona maccullochiana, commonly known as Ashburton pea,[1] is a species of flowering plant in the family Fabaceae. It is an upright annual with purple-reddish, pink or bluish pea-like flowers from spring to summer and is endemic to Western Australia.
Swainsona maccullochiana is an upright, single-stemmed herbaceous annual to high. The stems are over wide, sturdy, ribbed, needle-shaped, densely covered with fine, spreading hairs up to long that taper to a tip. The leaves up to long with 15-31 broadly egg-shaped to oval-shaped leaflets usually long, wide, apex usually pointed, occasionally rounded or notched. The 20-40 purplish-reddish, pink or bluish or sometimes white pea-like flowers are borne in racemes of differing age on a peduncle over wide, pedicels about long. The standard petal about long, wide, the wings about long and the keel deep. Flowering occurs from July to October and the fruit long, over wide and elliptic-shaped.[1] [2]
Swainsona maccullochiana was first formally described in 1869 by Ferdinand von Mueller and the description was published in Fragmenta Phytographiae Australiae.[3] [4] The specific epithet (maccullochiana) is in honour of James McCutcheon.[5]
Ashburton pea grows in moist, low lying areas near watercourses on loam in central Western Australia.[1]