Flexuosus:  Answers to key questions in Budd's Flora and Flora of Alberta leading to this species.  

	plants of dry plains and foothills; NOT [plants of moist habitats in the north and the mountains]
	plants with taproots and caudex; NOT [plants with rootstalks]
	stems evident, erect or decumbent, often branched and leafy; NOT [plants densely caespitose or pulvinate; leaves many, crowded; flowers often included among the leaves or barely exceeding them] (Flora of Alberta)
	plants low, cushion-like, matted or straggling; NOT [with erect or decumbent stems] (Budd's Flora)
	plants taller than 10 cm
	stems long; NOT short
	stems generally less than 5 mm thick at base; NOT 5-10 mm thick at base
	stems LACKING black hairs
	stems few-leafed; NOT densely leafed
	leaflets 15-21; NOT [11 or less]
	leaflets shorter than 2-4 (6) cm long
	leaflets narrowly oblong to oblanceolate; NOT elliptic ovate
	leaflets often truncate or retuse at the tip; NOT [acute at the tip, sometimes arcuate]
	leaflets NOT silvery pubescent
	leaflets NOT needle-like; NOT spine-tipped
	flowers borne on more or less well developed peduncles; NOT borne in the crown of the plant
	inflorescence elongating at maturity
	flowers 5-12 mm long; NOT 12-30 mm long
	calyx teeth shorter than the calyx-tube; NOT [about as long as or longer than the calyx-tube]
	calyx teeth deltoid to lanceolate; NOT linear
	petals blue, purple or pink or predominantly so (sometimes very pale with only flashes of deeper colour); NOT [petals mostly yellow, cream or orange, the keel sometimes tinged with blue or blue-tipped], NOT white
	keel-petals less than 6 mm long; NOT longer than 6 mm
	apex of keel bluntly rounded; NOT [keel-tip acuminate]
	pods cylindric; NOT flattened
	pods glabrous or with only white hairs; NOT [pods with at least some black hairs]