Spotted joepyeweed, eupatoire maculée

Eupatorium maculatum Linnaeus, Cent. Pl. I, 27. 1755; Eupatoriadelphus maculatus (Linnaeus) R. M. King & H. Robinson; Eupatorium purpureum Linnaeus subsp. maculatum (Linnaeus) Á. Löve & D. Löve; E. purpureum var. maculatum (Linnaeus) Voss; E. trifoliatum Linnaeus var. maculatum (Linnaeus) Farwell

Plants 60–200 cm. Stems usually purple-spotted, sometimes uniformly purple, usually solid, sometimes hollow near bases, glabrous proximally to densely puberulent throughout, glandular-puberulent distally. Leaves in (3s–)4s–5s(–6s); petioles 5–20 mm, glabrous or pubescent; blades pinnately veined, lance-elliptic to lanceolate or lance-ovate, mostly (6–)8–23(–30) × (1.5–)2–7(–9) cm, bases gradually or abruptly tapered, margins sharply serrate or doubly serrate, abaxial faces gland-dotted and densely pubescent to glabrate, adaxial faces sparingly hairy or glabrous. Heads in flat-topped, corymbiform arrays. Involucres often purplish, 6.5–9 × 3.5–7 mm. Phyllaries glabrous or densely pubescent. Florets (8–)9–20(–22); corollas purplish, 4.5–7.5 mm. Cypselae 3–5 mm. 2n = 20.

Varieties 3 (3 in the flora): North America.

Eutrochium maculatum has the widest geographic distribution and greatest morphologic variability among species in the genus. The three varieties recognized here show intergradation where the ranges overlap.