Photos 1 & 3: © Robin Baranowski

Photo 2: © Doug McGrady; Photo 4: © Missouri Plants

November’s Mystery Plant is a native perennial that grows in wet areas and reaches 2 to 5 feet in late summer. Stiff four-angled stems are topped by a bloom of many pencil-like flower spikes branching upwards, like the arms of a candelabra. Individual flower spikes have a ring of blue-purple flowers blooming from the bottom up. Leaves are opposite, lanceolate, and coarsely-toothed.

It is…

Botanical Name: Verbena hastata
Common Name: blue vervain
Family: Verbenaceae (Vervain family)
Habitat: meadows, fields, wetland margins

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