VERVAIN FAMILY 
| 
VERBENACEAE | 
BRACTED VERBENA 
Verbena bracteosa Michx. 
All Vervains are bracted; that is, the flowers are arranged 
in a spike which is in the axil of a bract. But this is the only | 
common species that has conspicuous bracts longer than the 
species. The square stem may be 18 inches high and the whole plant — 
flowers and fruits. 
This is the only common species” 
that is annual instead of perennial and 
partly for this reason it is more weed- 
like than the others. It is found in 
waste places along roadsides and rail- 
roads and in fields from Virginia and 
Minnesota to British Columbia, south 
to Florida, Arizona and California. 
The whole plant is exceedingly 
hairy, and the 4-angled, much branched 
stems are 6-15 inches long. They do 
not grow upright like the other Ver- 
vains but are low and more or less 
prostrate like the Verbenas of our 
gardens. The bracts are rather stiff 
and the lower, like all the leaves, are 
often sharply lobed. 
The flowers, blooming from June 
to September, are purplish blue and in 
structure resemble those of the Nar- 
row-leaved Vervain, page 268, though 
about two-thirds the size, or little 
more than one-eighth inch long. 
The Small-flowered Verbena, Verbena 
bipinnatifida Nutt., is a less common, branching and sprawling per-— 
ennial whose flowers resemble the garden Verbena, or Mexican 
may be hairy. The leaves are once or twice pinnately divided into 
linear or oblong segments. The dense spikes are terminal and short, — 
lengthening in fruit. The purple or lilac corollas are one-half inch — 
long and equally broad. The bracts are linear-awl shaped and mostly — 
shorter than the fruit. The latter is slightly more than one-eighth — 
inch long. This is a western species at home on dry plains and prairies ; 
from western Illinois and Nebraska to Missouri, Texas and Mexico. 
270 
