Campanula rapunculoides L.

Hairy or hispid rhizomatous perennial, with erect stems to 1 m tall and creeping, slender rhizomes. Basal and lowermost cauline lvs with long slender petioles > lamina; lamina 6-10 × 3-6 cm, ovate, hairy, especially on veins below, crenate-serrate; base subcordate or cordate; apex short-acuminate or acute; most cauline lvs sessile or shortly petiolate, 5-15 × 0.7-5 cm, narrow-ovate or lanceolate; base cuneate to attenuate, otherwise similar to basal lvs. Lower bracts similar to upper cauline lvs; upper bracts linear to subulate, mostly > pedicels. Racemes long, terminal, puberulent; fls secund, ± nodding; pedicels c. 5 mm long, puberulent, becoming ± recurved by anthesis. Calyx teeth c. 7 mm long, narrowly oblong or lanceolate, hairy or glabrate, reflexed. Corolla 2-3 cm long, campanulate-funnelform, violet-blue or bluish mauve; lobes = or slightly < tube, not spreading widely or reflexing. Stigmas 3-(4). Capsule 3-celled, 6-9 mm long, obovoid, dehiscing by basal slits.

Fields and woods. Naturalised in Britain where it grows in fields and more or less disturbed grassy areas such as railway banks, occasionally in woods, usually near to houses.

The fleshy underground branches can be chopped and added to soups or boiled. The young shoots are cooked as a vegetable and used as a potherb.

Can be grown by cuttings, divisions or seedlings.