Common name:
Whitestem hedgenettle
Family:
Scientific name:
Stachys albens
Main flower color:
Range:
California, south Nevada and far southwest Utah
Height:
Up to 8 feet
Habitat:
Streamsides, seeps, boggy places, moist grassland; up to 9,500 feet
Leaves:
Broadly ovate to lanceolate, up to 6 inches long, toothed, hairy, stalked
Season:
May to October
Stachys albens is a tall species, up to 8 feet, with a stout, branched, four-angled stem, densely covered in thick, cobwebby hairs, giving it a whitish appearance. Leaves are also hairy, especially underneath, and they are lined by relatively large, shallow teeth. Leaves are heart-shaped at the base, and they are attached by stalks of up to 2 inches. Leaf tips are rounded.
Flowers are arranged at the tips of the stem branches, in elongated arrays of up to 12 inches; in separated whorls, at the leaf nodes, up to 12 flowers per cluster. Corollas are usually white, sometimes pale pink. The lower lip is marked by purple blotches, and is shallowly divided into two angular side lobes and a larger, rounded central lobe. The four stamens (two unequal pairs) are exserted. The hairy calyx is divided about half its length into five triangular lobes.
Flowers are arranged at the tips of the stem branches, in elongated arrays of up to 12 inches; in separated whorls, at the leaf nodes, up to 12 flowers per cluster. Corollas are usually white, sometimes pale pink. The lower lip is marked by purple blotches, and is shallowly divided into two angular side lobes and a larger, rounded central lobe. The four stamens (two unequal pairs) are exserted. The hairy calyx is divided about half its length into five triangular lobes.
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