Large-flower hemp-nettle

Galeopsis speciosa, the large-flower hemp-nettle or large-flowered hemp-nettle, is a coarse, bristly annual herb in the family Lamiaceae. It grows on stout, square stems often swollen at the nodes, with opposite pairs of ovate, coarsely toothed leaves that resemble nettle foliage but lack stinging hairs. From summer into early autumn it produces showy two-lipped flowers in dense axillary whorls; the corolla is typically pale yellow with a deep purple blotch on the lower lip, giving the species its name. The fruit consists of four small nutlets enclosed in the persistent spiny calyx. Native to northern and central Europe and Siberia, it is a plant of cereal fields, fallow land, hedgerows, woodland margins and damp ditches on fertile, often sandy or peaty soils, and has become a widespread introduced weed in eastern Canada. The plant is considered poisonous and is reported to cause paralysis, contraindicating any consumption.