Al Schneider's Rocky Mountains Plant Descriptions

American Dragonhead
Dracocephalum parviflorum
Mint family (Lamiaceae)

American Dragonhead (Dracocephalum parviflorum) has light green, coarsely leaves which stand stiffly out in an open, airy pattern from an erect, thick, square stem. When you spot one plant, you will often find a dozen more in the same area, but spotting the first is the challenge. Flowers are tiny and light pink in a swirl at the tip of the tall stem.

Linnaeus named this in 1753. The Greek "Dracon" means "dragon" and "cephalos," "head." "" is Latin for "small flower." Thomas Nuttall, Harvard Professor of Botany, naturalist, and explorer collected this species in 1811 along the Missouri River near Fort Mandan, North Dakota, and described and named it in his " of North American Plants" in 1818.


©2009 Russ Kleinman, Richard Felger, Sarah
Johnson & Kevin Keith, Western New Mexico
University Department of Natural Sciences and the
Dale A. Zimmerman Herbarium

Description

to plant, erect, leafy stems to 1 1/2' tall, more or less hairy. Leaves to over 2" long, to , the lower coarsely , the upper with -like , hairy. to 1/2" long. tube enlarging above, 2-lipped, with the upper lip spreading and 3-, blue to light rose to pink, scarcely longer than the . a .

Field Marks

Tall, slender plant with large triangular leaves and clusters of small blue to rose to pink flowers.

© Al Schneider

corolla -- The name for all the petals of a flower taken together.

A perennial plant lives and blooms for many years.

Cut deeply and (usually) unevenly (a condition intermediate between toothed and lobed).

spine -- a stiff, sharp structure formed by the modification of a plant organ that contains vascular tissue. A spine can be formed by a latteral branch, a modified leaf or a thorn.

A herb is a plant whose stems die back to the ground in the winter.

An annual plant is a plant that completes its life cycle, from germination to the production of seed, within one year, and then dies.

serrate -- toothed with asymmetrical teeth pointing forward; like the cutting edge of a saw.

calyx -- the sepals of a flower, typically forming a whorl that encloses the petals and forms a protective layer around a flower in bud.

a small nut. A nut being a hard, dry fruit containing only one seed that does not open at maturity.

Like the teeth on a saw, leaves and other surfaces can have toothed edges.

fruit -- any seed-bearing structure in flowering plants. It is formed from the ovary after flowering.

lanceolate -- Lance-shaped. Long, wider in the middle.

lobe -- Being divided by clefts.

genus -- A subdivision of a botanical Family in which all members have a significant number of similar characteristics.

parviflorum -- Small-flowered.

oblong -- Having an elongated form with somewhat parallel sides. Rectangular.