Duration: Perennial

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Forb/Herb

General: Annual or perennial herbs, 20-45 cm tall; stems several from a common base, branched, densely hairy and glandular.

Leaves: Opposite and petiolate; blades mostly 3-cleft, the divisions mostly toothed or cleft; bases tapering into the petioles; both surfaces villous-hirsute.

Flowers: Purple and showy, in short, dense spikes; spikes capitate in flower and elongated in fruit; each flower subtended by a bractlet a little shorter than the calyx; calyx 7-11 mm long, villous-hirsute and glandular; corolla pink, lavender, violet or blue, salverform, the tube a little longer than calyx.

Fruits: Nutlets about 3 mm long, reticulate with a striate base.

Ecology: Found on dry slopes below 5,000 ft (1524 m); flowers throughout the year.

Distribution: s CA, s NV, s UT, AZ, NM, CO, TX, OK and AL; south to c MEX.

Notes: Glandularia species are densely hairy herbs that have spike inflorescences with closely packed blue, purple, or pink flowers, the petals fused into a funnel shape and topped with 5 lobes; each flower in the spike has a bract beneath it, which in some species is quite showy. G. gooddingii has showy, pink, lavender, violet or blue flowers; 3-cleft leaves which can be deeply cleft or shallowly lobed; corolla tubes only slightly longer than the calyces; herbage with conspicuous long hairs; and glands on the calyces and stems. Distinguish from G. bipinnatifida by the floral bractlets which are slightly shorter than the calyces; the glands on the calyx; and the corolla tube only a little longer than the calyx (vs. 1.5 times longer in G. bipinnatifida).

Ethnobotany: Acts as a sedative, diphoretic, diuretic, bitter tonic, and antispasmodic.

Etymology: Glandularia is based in Latin and means full of glands, while gooddingii, is named for Leslie Newton Goodding (1880-1967) a botanist who explored southern Arizona, and is the father of Charlotte Reeder.

Synonyms: Verbena arizonica, V. gooddingii, V. gooddingii var. nepetifolia, V. verna, V. var. fissa

Editor: SBuckley 2010, FSCoburn 2015, AHazelton 2015