LABIATE— MINT FAMILY 



GROUND-IVY. GILL-OVER-THE-GROUND 



(! 



\Nepeta glecdma. Glecdma hederdcea 

 ^€</€)f Atea 



Perennial. Naturalized from Europe. Found in damp 

 or shaded places. Newfoundland, Ontario, and Min- 

 nesota, south to Georgia and Kansas. Common in 

 northern Ohio. April-September. 



Stem. — Square, creeping and trailing, leafy, often form- 

 ing dense green mats. 



Leaves. — Opposite, petioled, round kidney-shaped, scal- 

 loped, green throughout the winter, downy. 



Flowers. — Violet-blue, two-lipped, in loose axillary clus- 

 ters. 



Calyx. — Tubular, obliquely five-toothed. 



Corolla. — Two-lipped; upper lip is erect and notched 

 at the middle and arches over stamens and pistil. The 

 lower lip, violet, spotted with dark purple, is three-lobed, 

 middle lobe largest. 



Stamens. — Four, in two pairs ascending under the 

 upper lip; the lower pair the shorter, inserted on the tube 

 of the corolla. 



Pistil. — Four-lobed; style two-lobed. 



Fruit. — Four little nutlets. 



Pollinated by many insects. Anthers and stamens 

 mature at different times in most of the flowers. 



In Europe, where the aromatic leaves of this little 

 creeper were long ago used for fermenting and clarifying 



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