I.C. Hedge

Perennial, herbaceous, with simple eglandular and glandular hairs, with a foetid odour. Stems erect, 30-100 cm, quadrangular, rather slender, with long spreading eglandular and shorter glandular hairs, denser above. Leaves thintextured, broadly ovate-cordate, c. 8 x 5 cm, regularly crenate-serrate, all long petiolate. Verticillasters c. 6-flowered, distant below, crowded above. Bracts very small, linear-setaceous. Calyx tubular campanulate, 5-7 mm, glandular-pubescent, 10-nerved, often purplish, not bilabiate; teeth equal, 5, triangular, acuminate-spinulose; tube glabrous within. Corolla purplish pink, c. 15 mm; lower lip longer than straight upper lip. Staminal filaments slightly exserted below corolla upper lip. Nutlets broad ovoid, dark brown, c. 1.5 x 1.2 mm, neither trigonous nor truncate.

Fl. Per.: June-August.

Type: Europe (LINN 736/1 - microfiche!).

Distribution: temperate Eurasia, N. America.

A mesophytic species widespread throughout Europe and Asia, but apparently very local in our area.