Canyon sweetpea, also known as hillside pea, common Pacific pea or wild sweetpea, is a pubescent to slightly glabrous climbing perennial to 9' long with a raceme of 5-12 whitish to pale pink sometimes lavender flowers and leaves which are even-pinnate with 8-12 linear to ovate mucronate leaflets up to 2" long and branched, coiling terminal tendrils.  The pods are many-seeded, 1/4" wide and up to 3" long.  Sweetpea is a common and widespread inhabitant of dry to shaded places below 5000' in chaparral, coastal sage scrub and oak woodland, from the Santa Monicas through the San Gabriels to the San Jacinto and Santa Rosa Mts.  It is quite variable and may hybridize with other species, and its blooming period is April to June.  It was formerly called Lathyrus laetiflorus.

Click here for Latin name derivations: 1) Lathyrus 2) vestitus.
Pronunciation: LA-thi-rus ves-TI-tus.
Click here for Botanical Term Meanings.