GROUND IVY 219 
Ground Ivy (Nepeta hederacea, Trev.) 
The present distribution of Ground Ivy is the North Temperate 
Zone in Europe, Siberia, Western Asia, as far east as the Himalayas, 
and in America it is an introduced plant. It is not found with any 
other plants in ancient deposits. In Great Britain it is more or less 
universally distributed, but does not grow in Cardigan, Stirling, S. 
Perth, North Ebudes, and in the W. Highlands in Ross only, and not 
vir 
Y 
¥ 
> Photo, B. Hanley 
Growunp Ivy (Nefeta hederacea, Trev.) 
in the Northern Isles. In Northumberland, moreover, it ascends to 
300 ft. 
Every hedgerow is covered in spring with the trailing, creeping 
Ground Ivy, which carpets the ground under the hedgerows along 
highways and in fields. It grows on sloping banks, covering wide 
spaces. It is also to be found in woods, though it prefers a hedge- 
bank in the open facing the south and the sun. 
Ground Ivy, as the second Latin (and English) name implies, has 
the habit of the Ivy, the trailing habit, rooting at intervals, with suberect 
flower-stalks. The stem, which is smooth or hairy, is square and 
slender, and branched. The leaves are egg-shaped, opposite, on long 
leaf-stalks, kidney-shaped, scalloped, veined, the leaf-stalks furrowed 
below. 
The flowers are purple or bluish-violet, or white or pink with spots, 
