General: Stout biennial herb from a taproot; stems single, erect, 0.3-1.2 m tall, white- to yellowish-woolly.
Leaves: Basal leaves in a rosette, oblong-elliptic, tapering to a stalked base, round-toothed, woolly on both surfaces; stem leaves numerous, alternate, progressively reduced and more lanceolate upward, smooth above, woolly beneath, becoming unstalked and entire, with clasping leaf-bases not or slightly decurrent along the stem.
Flowers: Inflorescence a bracted, spike-like, terminal cluster, at first dense later elongating and spacing-out some of the numerous, very short-stalked flowers; corollas yellow to orange-yellow, sometimes white, wheel-shaped, 2-5 cm across, 5-lobed, the lobes nearly equal, concave, the tube very short; calyces 5-12 mm long, longer than the flower stalks, hairy, deeply 5-lobed, the lobes lanceolate; stamens 5, the 3 upper filaments densely, long, white-hairy, the 2 lower filaments smooth or nearly so.
Fruits: Capsules, ellipsoid to egg-shaped, 5-8 mm long; seeds numerous.
1. Plants more or less densely stalked-glandular upward, essentially smooth below; leaves green.......................Verbascum blattaria
1. Plants woolly throughout with branched, non-glandular hairs; leaves greyish.
2. Inflorescences loose, often branching at the base; leaves unstalked, not decurrent on the stem or only slightly so; plants loosely woolly...........................Verbascum phlomoides
2. Inflorescences dense, simple; leaves stalked, at least below, decurrent on the stem, usually as far as the next leaf below; plants densely woolly............................Verbascum thapsus
Habitat / Range
Mesic to moist roadsides, fields and waste places; rare in SW BC (Gulf Islands and adjacent mainland) and SC BC (Kelowna); introduced from Eurasia.
 - field view pl - july 6, 2006.jpg)
