Plants of South Eastern New South Wales
Verbena bonariensis
Common name
Purpletop
Family
Verbenaceae
Where found
Woodland, grassy areas, disturbed sites, gardens, crops, orchards, roadsides, and near streams. Widespread. No longer considered to occur in the ACT. Previous records in the ACT were actually Verbena incompta.
Notes
Introduced perennial herb to 2 m high. Stems conspicuously 4-angled in cross section, surface slightly rough. Leaves opposite each other, 4–22 cm long, 6–70 mm wide, covered with coarse lines or furrows, rough and slightly hairy above, tomentose below; tips pointed, margins toothed to incised, bases somewhat cordate and partly stem clasping. Flowers blue, dark violet-purple or lavender-pink, tubular, the tube 6–7 mm long, with 5 five spreading lobes each about 2 mm long. Flower tubes about twice as long as the calyx. Calyx 5-toothed. Bracts, calyx and flower stalks distinctly glandular. Flowers densely clustered at the tops of the stems, with long branches ending in a dense spike. Flowers October to March.
PlantNET description: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Verbena~bonariensis (accessed 28 January, 2021)
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