Plants herbs or shrubs. Leaves simple or compound, if compound with 1 leaflets or digitately compound with 3-7 leaflets. Inflorescences racemes, usually terminal or opposite the leaves. Calyx lobes (4-)5 or 3 by union of the upper and lateral lobes. Corolla usually yellow, keel rounded or angled, usually with a prominent beak. Stamens 10, united, with 5 long and 5 short anthers. Pods usually inflated, dehiscent, 1-many seeded.
Crotalaria includes around 600 species that grow in the tropics and subtropics, particularly of the southern hemisphere. They are most numerous in tropical Africa where about 500 species grow.
Several species are reported as having pods and/or seeds that are poisonous to livestock but the foliage of some species is said to be good browse.
