Leonurus cardiaca L.
motherwort
Scarcely aromatic perennial. Stems to c. 1.5 m tall, hairy, especially on angles. Petioles to c. 20 cm long, densely hairy. Lamina variously lobed or dissected; lamina of lower lvs 6-10 × 5.5-10 cm, broad-ovate, usually 7-lobed with lobes lobulate, dark shining green and with appressed hairs above, more densely hairy below, especially on the veins; base cordate. Upper lvs and bracts similar, 3-5-lobed; lobes nearly entire or coarsely toothed; base broad-cuneate to rounded; apex acuminate. Calyx tube 3-4 mm long, sparsely hairy or glabrous; teeth 2-3 mm long, subulate, the lower becoming deflexed. Corolla 8-10 mm long (to apex of upper lip), pale pink except for purple spots on upper and lower lips; tube with ring of white hairs inside; upper lip c. 4.5 mm long, with white-villous hairs outside; lower lip 3-4 mm long, with recurved lobes. Nutlets c. 2 mm long, sharply angled, with apical tuft of hairs.
N.: locally abundant in N. Hawke's Bay; S.: Otago (near Oamaru and Kakanui).
Europe 1969
Shady waste places, often around old homesteads.
FL Dec-Feb.
In nearly all the tropical island groups north of N.Z. the similar Asiatic L. sibiricus L. is now common, but as yet it has not been reported from N.Z. It differs from L. cardiaca by its lvs which are almost compound with narrow-oblong lobes, the long-linear and often entire upper bracts, and the glabrous nutlets.
