Chaparral Pea is a medium growing Summer deciduous vine with small rounded leaves that are medium to dark green. The plant grows fast in the Spring but fizzles out in the Summer. The plant is not super common, but is often found growing over Coastal Sage Scrub plant communities. The flowers are a beautiful magenta.

In the garden, this plant isn’t commonly found. It would be used as a color pop in an erect shrub such as Manzanita, Lilac, Mountain Mahogany or Scrub Oak. The plant is hard to start from seed, but does send out runners if you can get it established. I took some seed from nature and put in my garden. Nothing happened for a couple of years until it popped up in the 2022-2023 rains. I pulled it out thinking it was a weed, made a yelping noise and then stuck it back in the ground. It seems to be stunted but surviving.