General: Legume Family (Fabaceae). Groundnut (Apios americana) is a perennial herb from slender rhizomes with tuberous thickenings 1.3-4 cm (0.5-1.6 in) thick, and stems twining or climbing over other plants. The leaves are alternate, pinnately, egg-shaped, 2-10 cm (3/4-4 in) long, 1.8-7 cm (0.7-2.7 in) wide, and sometimes hairy. The flowers are in rounded clusters among leaves. Groundnut blooms from July to October. The flowers have 5 parts, the upper one round, white and reddish brown, the 2 side wings curved down and brown-purple, the lower 2 petals sickle-shaped and brownish red. The fruits are dry, straight or slightly curved, narrow, and 5-10 mm (3/16-3/8 in) long. The fleshy legume fruits are 6-12 mm (0.2-.5 in) in diameter and indehiscent (the fruit coils back after opening), usually with 1 seed. The seeds are oblong or square, dark brown, with wrinkled surfaces.

Groundnut, wild potato, Indian potato, wild sweet potato, American potato bean, wild bean, ground bean, hopniss, Dakota peas, sea vines, pea vines, pomme de terre, patates en chapelet, American potato bean

Apios americana var. turrigera Fernald:
United States (North America)

Note: This information is based on publications available through Tropicos and may not represent the entire distribution. Tropicos does not categorize distributions as native or non-native.

Apios americana Medik.:
Canada (North America)
United States (North America)

Note: This information is based on publications available through Tropicos and may not represent the entire distribution. Tropicos does not categorize distributions as native or non-native.

Glycine apios L.:
Canada (North America)
United States (North America)

Note: This information is based on publications available through Tropicos and may not represent the entire distribution. Tropicos does not categorize distributions as native or non-native.

Canada

Origin: Unknown/Undetermined

Regularity: Regularly occurring

Currently: Unknown/Undetermined

Confidence: Confident

United States

Origin: Native

Regularity: Regularly occurring

Currently: Present

Confidence: Confident

Type of Residency: Year-round

For current distribution, please consult the Plant Profile page for this species on the PLANTS Web site. Groundnut is distributed through the great prairie from Quebec to Minnesota, North Dakota, south to north central Colorado, Florida, and Texas.

Perennial, Herbs, Vines, twining, climbing, Plants with rhizomes or suckers, Tuber s or tuberous roots present, Nodules present, Stems less than 1 m tall, Stems 1-2 m tall, Stems greater than 2 m tall, Plants with milky latex, Stems solid, Stems or young twigs glabrous or sparsely glabrate, Leaves alternate, Leaves petiolate, Stipules setiform, subulate or acicular, Stipules deciduous, Stipules free, Leaves compound, Leaves odd pinnate, Leaf or leaflet margins entire, Leaflets 5-9, Leaves glabrous or nearly so, Inflorescences racemes, Inflorescence axillary, Bracts very small, absent or caducous, Bracteoles present, Flowers zygomorphic, Calyx 5-lobed, Calyx glabrous, Calyx hairy, Petals separate, Corolla papilionaceous, Petals clawed, Petals reddish brown, maroon, Banner petal ovoid or obovate, Banner petal suborbicular, broadly rounded, Banner petal auriculate, Wing petals narrow, oblanceolate to oblong, Wing tips obtuse or rounded, Keel petals auriculate, spurred, or gibbous, Keel abruptly curved, or spirally coiled, Keel petals fused on sides or at tip , Stamens 9-10, Stamens diadelphous, 9 united, 1 free, Filaments glabrous, Style terete, Style spirally coiled, Fruit a legume, Fruit unilocular, Fruit freely dehiscent, Fruit elongate, straight, Fruit oblong or ellipsoidal, Fruit strongly curved, falcate, bent, or lunate, Fruit coriaceous or becoming woody, Fruit exserted from calyx, Valves twisting or coiling after dehiscence, Fruit glabrous or glabrate, Fruit 3-10 seeded, Seeds ovoid to rounded in outline, Seed surface wrinkled or rugose, Seeds olive, brown, or black.

Isotype for Apios americana var. turrigera Fernald
Catalog Number: US 1810422
Collection: Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of Natural History, Department of Botany
Preparation: Pressed specimen
Collector(s): M. L. Fernald & B. H. Long
Year Collected: 1938
Locality: Sand beach of James River, below Sunken Meadow Beach., Surry, Virginia, United States, North America

Adaptation: Groundnut grows in wet meadows, low thickets, banks of streams and ponds, sloughs, moist prairie ravines, and moist soil in woodlands.

Propagation from Cuttings: Plant tubers two to three inches deep in the early spring (Kindscher 1992). After shoots establishment, mulch to stop competition from weeds and grass. Provide the young shoots with a traverse or other objectives upon which to climb. After one year of growth, several one inch-thick tubers can be harvested from each plant. Because of their vining nature, groundnut would be hard to grow on a field scale, and their annual yield appears to be quite low in comparison to other crops. Groundnut is difficult to cultivate mechanically, because each tuber can sprout and grow in the spring, filling in spaces between rows.

Apios americana (Groundnut)
(Bees suck nectar or collect pollen; observations are from Robertson)

Bees (long-tongued)
Megachilidae (Megachilini): Megachile brevis brevis sn cp, Megachile mendica sn fq

The following is a representative barcode sequence, the centroid of all available sequences for this species.


No available public DNA sequences.

Download FASTA File

Barcode of Life Data Systems (BOLDS) Stats
Public Records: 3
Specimens with Barcodes: 5
Species With Barcodes: 1

Canada

Rounded National Status Rank: NNR - Unranked

United States

Rounded National Status Rank: N5 - Secure

Rounded Global Status Rank: G5 - Secure

Please consult the PLANTS Web site and your State Department of Natural Resources for this plant’s current status, such as, state noxious status, and wetland indicator values.

APAM is available from native plant nurseries within its range.

Under development.

Ethnobotanic: According to Kelly Kindscher (1987), “groundnut is a common native food plant of temperate, eastern North America. Its distribution reaches west to the wet margins of prairies, where it was once used extensively by the Native Americans.”

Groundnut was a source of food among the Omaha, Dakota, Santee Sioux, Cheyenne, Osage, Pawnee, and Hidatsa (Gilmore 1913, Grinnell 1962, Matthews 1961, Wilson 1987). Groundnut was excavated from four Ozark bluff-dweller sites in Arkansas. The Ozark peoples are regarded as pre-Columbian (Beardsley 1939). Groundnuts “roots” were dug in the winter. The tubers were gathered all year but were best when harvested from late Fall through early spring. They were eaten raw, cooked, or dried and ground for flour. Some of the “roots” were boiled, peeled, and dried for storage. The seeds are cooked and eaten like peas in summer.

Groundnut was also an important food of New England colonists (Hedrick 1919). Once the colonists discovered the groundnut, they enacted a town law to prevent Indians from digging groundnut on English land. Groundnut tubers are a good source of carbohydrates and contain between 13 and 17 percent protein by dry weight, or about three times more than potatoes or any other widely used vegetable root (Yanovsky and Kingsbury 1938, Watt and Merrill 1963).

Horticultural: This plant is an attractive ornamental.