Clinopodium vulgare L.
wild basil
Scarcely aromatic herb. Stems lax or straggling, white-pilose. Lvs petiolate. Lamina 1.5-4 × 0.7-2.5 cm, ovate, hairy, often densely hairy below, entire to shallowly and remotely crenate or crenate-serrate; base broad-cuneate to rounded; apex obtuse. Bracteoles numerous, nearly = calyx, white-plumose. Calyx 7-9 mm long, white-plumose; teeth subulate, purplish; lower lip with longer teeth. Corolla 10-15 mm long, pink, densely hairy outside; lower lip almost 2× upper lip. Nutlets 9-10 mm diam., subglobose or broad-oblong, slightly angular ventrally.
N.: Waitakere Range (W. of Auckland) to Wellington, especially Bay of Plenty; S.: common in Nelson, the Marlborough Sounds, Banks Peninsula and N. Otago, rare elsewhere.
Europe, W. Asia, N. America 1943
Wetter areas and modified habitats, particularly around hedges, scrub margins, and along roadsides and clearings through forest.
FL Dec-May.
This sp. has been placed in several related genera; in N.Z. it has been known as Satureja vulgaris (L.) Fritsch or Calamintha clinopodium Moris.
Because of its similar common name C. vulgare is sometimes confused with the popular culinary herb basil, Ocimum basilicum L. in N.Z. The latter is an annual with glabrous lvs.
