URTICACE^— NETTLE FAMILY 



STINGING NETTLE 



JJrlica dioica 

 « 



Urtica, the ancient Latin name. 



Perennial. Naturalized from Europe. A plant bear- 

 ing stinging hairs, found in waste land, near barns, along 

 roadsides, crowns rubbish heaps. Nova Scotia to On- 

 tario and Minnesota, southward to South Carolina and 

 Missouri. 



Stems. — Two to four feet high, stout, four-ridged, 

 hollow, set with fiercely stinging hairs. 



Leaves. — Opposite, long-petioled, ovate, rounded or 

 heart-shaped at base, serrate, acute or acuminate, downy 

 beneath; stipules lanceolate. 



Flowers. — Mostly dioecious, small, greenish, growing 

 in the axils of the upper leaves in compound clusters. 



Calyx. — In staminate flower four sepals, alike and equal. 

 Pistillate flowers have two sepals larger than the other 

 two. 



Corolla. — Wanting. 



Stamens. — Four. 



Pistil. — Ovary one-celled. Fruit an akene. 



Pollinated by the wind. Pollen abundant, no nectar. 



If the Stinging Nettle has no beauty, it possesses 

 a forceful personality, for it is armed with poison hairs, 

 a fact so well known that Culpepper, writing of the 

 English flora in 1653, remarks that the Nettles need no 



