Erect perennial to 15 dm, with 10–34 nodes below the infl, often branched at the top and bearing several racemes 5–15 cm; lvs all sessile, or the lowest 1–7 pairs petiolate but soon deciduous; sessile lvs 2–18 cm, mostly oblanceolate or elliptic, generally not clasping, sharply or less often bluntly toothed, rarely entire; upper lvs scarcely to evidently reduced; raceme-axis short-hairy and sometimes also stipitate-glandular; cal often glandular-punctate and sometimes also stipitate-glandular; cor (14–)16–35 mm, densely puberulent to glabrous, not glandular; 2n=38. In a wide range of mostly ± open habitats; Me. and Que. to Man. and N.D., s. to Fla. and n. Mex., seldom near the coast except as an escape from cult. July–Sept. Highly variable, here divided into 2 well marked geographic vars.: The relatively northern var. virginiana, seldom occurring as far s. as Va., Tenn., Mo., and Kans., is generally clonal, with the stems scattered on long, horizontal rhizomes; it lacks empty floral bracts below the infl. (P. denticulata; P. formosior) The relatively southern var. arenaria Shimek, seldom occurring n. to n. O., n. Ill., and Io., generally has the stems clustered on a short caudex (without long rhizomes), and very often has some empty floral bracts below the infl; it typically grows in drier sites than var. virginiana. (P. praemorsa; P. v. ssp. praemorsa; P. v. var. reducta; P. serotina) Many garden and escaped plants are ± intermediate, with the rhizomes of var. virginiana and the empty bracts of var. arenaria, but primary intergradation occurs mainly in c. and e. Tenn., c. and e. Ky., and adjoining territory.
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