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Fabaceae family

Narrowleaf Lupine Lupinus angustifolius

Deer-resistant — Low palatability to browsing deer, and rated toxic — which deer tend to avoid. Usually passed over, but no plant is truly deer-proof when food is scarce.
USDA livestock toxicity rating — not a pet assessment. See the Toxicity detail further down for what's documented.

Narrowleaf Lupine is an introduced annual herb, found in the lower 48 states. It grows to 4 ft and blooms Aug in part shade – shade, with green fruit.

⚠ Invasive here — plant a native instead USDA + GBIF

Narrowleaf Lupine is flagged invasive in the U.S. These natives fill a similar niche — same growth habit, bloom season, height, and region — so you keep the look and feed local wildlife instead of spreading a problem.

Eastern Annual Saltmarsh Aster
Native
Eastern Annual Saltmarsh Aster
Symphyotrichum subulatum
●●●●●
Sawtooth Sunflower
Native
Sawtooth Sunflower
Helianthus grosseserratus
●●●●●
Seaside Goldenrod
Native
Seaside Goldenrod
Solidago sempervirens
●●●●●
Devil's Beggartick
Native
Devil's Beggartick
Bidens frondosa
●●●●○
Matched on growth habit · bloom months · mature height · shared U.S. range (USDA + GBIF) — a starting point, not a prescription.

Growing & care

USDA PLANTS · TRY
Conditions
Sources · Conditions
USDA PLANTS — Sun · Soil & moisture
USDA — SoilPH — Soil pH
USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503) — Fertility Requirement / Soil Adaptation — Fertility need · Adapts to
USDA — Temp-Min °F — Hardiness
Sun
Part shade – shade
Soil & moisture
Medium moisture
Soil pH
5.6–7.5
Fertility need
Medium
Adapts to
Coarse (sandy), Medium (loam)
Hardiness
USDA zone 10+
Size & form
Sources · Size & form
USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503) — Height, Mature — Height
USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503) — Growth Rate / Spread / Growth Form / Lifespan / Active Growth Period / Seed Period — Spread · Growth rate · Growth form · Active growth
USDA PLANTS — Lifespan
TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0) · USDA PLANTS — Foliage
USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503) — Fruit/Seed Color / Fruit Persistence — Fruit
Height
4 ft
Spread
None — clumping
Growth rate
Rapid
Growth form
Single crown
Lifespan
Annual
Foliage
Broadleaf · medium texture
Active growth
Autumn through spring
Fruit
Green persists into winter
In the garden
Sources · In the garden
USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503) — Propagation Method / Commercial Availability — Propagate by · In the trade
USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503) — Germination (cold stratification) — Seed starting
USDA PLANTS — Seed Period — Seeds ripen
USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503) — Foliage Texture / Browse Palatability / Resprout — Deer browsing · Resprouts if cut
Propagate by
Seed
Seed starting
No stratification needed
Seeds ripen
Summer – Autumn seed-collection / harvest window
In the trade
No known commercial source
Deer browsing
Low often deer-resistant
Resprouts if cut
No
Shrub layer — Sits in the shrub of a layered food forest or polyculture.Open guide →
Nitrogen fixer — Fixes atmospheric nitrogen through root-nodule bacteria — builds soil fertility for itself and its neighbours, cutting fertiliser need.Open guide →
derived roles
The garden year bloom → fruit → fall colour
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
Bloom
Bloom (the flower's colour)
Bloom · Aug — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503) — BloomPeriod
When to sow · for your area

Sow timing keys off your local last- and first-frost dates.

Species characteristics from USDA PLANTS (public domain) + TRY (CC BY) — general guidance, not a guarantee for your exact site. Deer "browsing" is documented palatability, not a deer-proof claim.

Wildlife & pollinators

How pollinator value is scored →
❧ Caterpillar hosts ~33 caterpillar species

Lupinus supports ~33 caterpillar species.

Native butterfly & moth caterpillars are the base of the terrestrial food web — most songbirds rear their young almost entirely on them. As a host for native Lepidoptera this is a strong genus.

Recorded feeding on Lupinus in North America, including:

Anacampsis lupinella · twirler moth Arachnis picta · Painted Tiger Moth Arctia caja · Garden Tiger Areniscythris brachypteris Argyrotaenia citrana · leafroller moth Argyrotaenia franciscana · Orange Tortrix
+ 8 more species →
Autographa californica · Alfalfa Looper Moth Caenurgina crassiuscula · owlet moth Caloreas augustella Celastrina argiolus · Holly Blue Chionodes braunella · twirler moth Colias alexandra · Queen Alexandra's Sulphur Colias eurytheme · Orange Sulphur Colias hecla · Hecla Sulphur
Keystone count (genus-level) from Warren II 2026 (CC0) · Tallamy host-use records. Named species (a documented Nearctic sample, not exhaustive) from NHM HOSTS (CC0).
✦ Bees specialist-bee host · 29 bee visitors

Specialist native bees depend on it.

Some native bees are pollen specialists (oligolectic) — they raise young only on pollen from particular plant genera. Lupinus is a recorded specialist-bee host, so losing it can mean losing the bee that relies on it.

Xerces pollinator conservation →

29 native & managed bee species are documented visiting Narrowleaf Lupine — the 12 most-recorded:

Andrena canadensis · Canada Andrena · ✦ specialist Andrena gelriae · mining bee Andrena intermedia · mining bee Andrena labialis · mining bee Andrena wilkella · mining bee Anthidium loti
+ 6 more bees →
Anthophora aestivalis · digger bee Bombus argillaceus · bumble bee Eucera pollinosa · long-horned bee Hoplitis ravouxi Lasioglossum glabriusculum · sweat bee Lasioglossum griseolum · sweat bee
Specialist hosts from Smith et al. 2024. Visitor records (observations, not exhaustive) from Noori et al. 2026 (CC BY 4.0) · GloBI → · ✦ = pollen-specialist bee (Smith et al. 2024)
Species thumbnails re-hosted from iNaturalist — Creative Commons, credited per image (hover for credit). Click any species to see it on iNaturalist. Not exhaustive; many taxa have no openly-licensed photo yet.
How we know this (2) Methods & honest limits
Leaf build Direct fact

We read each species’ measured specific leaf area (leaf area per unit dry weight) from the Global Spectrum dataset and band it: thin & fast (high SLA), medium, or thick & tough (low SLA). The global median is about 10 mm²/mg.

Honest limits: A species-mean from pooled measurements — individual plants vary with light and site. A broad strategy signal, not a precise per-plant figure.

Díaz, S. et al. (2022) The global spectrum of plant form and function: enhanced species-level trait dataset. Scientific Data 9:755.
Photosynthesis Direct fact

A recorded categorical fact: each species is tagged C3 (standard), C4 (heat/water-efficient) or CAM (succulent, night-time CO₂ uptake) — or a facultative combination. We only show a trait card for the noteworthy C4/CAM cases; C3 is the unremarkable majority, kept in the data but not surfaced as a card.

Kattge, J. et al. TRY plant trait database — Categorical Traits Dataset (2012).
Derived values are computed from open data by a published method — labelled, cited, and never shown as a direct observation. Full methodology →
Sources for this entry (31) Open & cited
[01] Scientific name & family — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[02] Growth habit & duration — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[03] Native status & distribution — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[04] Common name — USDA PLANTS (via GBIF)
[17] Invasive / introduced status — US-RIIS v2.0 (USGS)
[19] Ecological value — Warren II 2026 (CC0) · Tallamy host-use counts · Smith et al. 2024 (CC BY)
[20] Conservation rank — NatureServe Explorer (CC BY)
[22] Functional traits — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)
[23] Photosynthetic pathway — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)
[24] Nitrogen fixation — Werner et al. 2014 (Dryad, CC0)
[28] Bee specialists — Smith et al. 2024 (Zenodo, CC BY 4.0)
[29] Flower-visitor value (derived) — Noori et al. 2026 (CC BY 4.0) · GloBI
[30] Caterpillar host count — Warren II 2026 (Dryad, CC0) · Tallamy host-use counts
[31] Caterpillar species — NHM HOSTS (CC0)
Spot an error or have a better photo? Every field links to its source, and the whole dataset is open.
Cite this page Open data, please attribute

PlantKey’s data is open under CC BY-SA 4.0 — free to reuse and adapt, with attribution and the same licence. Photos keep their own per-image licence + credit (see Sources above).

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