Family: Verbenaceae,
Vervain
Genus: Verbena
Description
General: annual or more often perennial. Stems usually
numerous, 10-60 cm long, trailing or creeping, sparsely
spreading-stiff-hairy, from a taproot. Small plants rarely
single-stemmed and erect.
 Leaves: opposite, coarsely flat-stiff-hairy, mostly with
winged stalks, the blade commonly 2-5 cm long and 1-2.5
cm wide, irregularly toothed and cleft, often with one or two
pairs of pinnate segments near the base, well differentiated
from the larger, terminal segment.
 Flowers: many in dense, elongated clusters up to 15
cm long, at the end of the main stem and branches. The
leaf-like bracts entire, lance-linear, spreading, 5-15 mm
long, conspicuously surpassing the 2.5-4 mm calyx of the
flowers. Corolla inconspicuous, almost hidden by the
bracts, bluish or pinkish to rarely white, the tube about
4 mm long, the limb 2-3 mm wide, unequally 5-lobed.
Flowering time: May-September.
 Fruits: small, dry, mostly enclosed in the calyx, readily
separating into 4 linear-oblong nutlets.
Distribution
Roadsides and other open disturbed habitats, often in
compacted soil, in most parts of MT. Also from B.C. to
ME, s. to CA, Mexico and FL. |
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