FIGWORT FAMILY SCROPHULARIACEAE 
MOTH MULLEIN 
Verbascum Blattaria L. 
There are two varieties of Moth Mullein, one with yellow 
and the other with white flowers, but they are otherwise the same. 
This species was introduced from Europe and is now found in 
fields and waste places from 
the Atlantic to the Pacific. 
The stem is rather slender, 
smooth, unbranched and 2-6 
feet high. The basal leaves 
are sometimes very large 
but they are seldom present 
at flowering time. 
The very handsome 
flowers are produced from 
June until late autumn in a 
loose raceme which may be 
as much as 2 feet long. Each 
flower opens but once, for a 
few hours in the early part 
of the day, and seldom are 
more than 3 or 4 open at 
any one time. The calyx is 
deeply 5-parted and the 
corolla is yellow or white 
with usually some brown 
marks on the back, and is 
also slightly unequally 5- 
lobed. The filaments of the 
5 stamens are covered with 
violet hairs. The capsule is 
nearly spherical. 
The Common Mullein, 
Verbascum Thapsus L., is 
densely woolly all over. The unbranched stem is tall and stout and 
winged by the bases of the leaves that extend down on it. The yel- 
low flowers are produced in a long and very dense spike. Usually 
the filaments of only the 3 upper stamens are white hairy, the 2 low- 
er being smooth. This plant is a biennial and the rosette of woolly 
leaves produced the first year remains green all winter. 
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