Verbena L.

Herbs, sometimes slightly woody basally; stems and branches procumbent, 3-scending, or erect, glabrous or variously pubescent. Leaves mostly decussate-Dpposite, rarely whorled, dentate (rarely entire) or variously lobed, incised, or pinnatifid. Inflorescences spicate; spikes terminal, usually densely many-flowered, Dften flat-topped and pseudo-umbellate or fasciculate-capitate, sometimes greatly elongate with densely crowded or scattered flowers, rarely also axillary, often greatly elongating only after anthesis. Flowers small or medium-sized, each solitary and axillary in a usually narrow bractlet; calyx usually tubular, 5-angled, 5-ribbed, unequally 5-toothed, not at all or but slightly changed in fruit, then herbaceous, mostly ventricose, eventually split, often connivent or contorted apically, thin-textured; corolla salverform or-funnelform, the tube cylindric, straight or curved, often slightly ampliate or subinflated apically, usually villous at the stamen-insertion within and barbate at the mouth, the limb flat, spreading or oblique, weakly 2-lipped, the lobes 5, usually elongate, more or less unequal, varying from obtuse or rounded to emarginate apically, the 2 posterior outermost and the anterior innermost in prefloration; stamens 4, didynamous, inserted in the upper half of the corolla-tube, included, the anthers ovate, with 2 parallel or slightly divergent thecae, dehiscing longitudinally, the dorsal connective un-appendaged and narrowly muticous or provided with a more or less conspicuous glandular appendage; gynoecium 2-carpelled, the ovary superior, entire or 4-lobed, apically situated on a somewhat lobed annular disc, completely 4-loculed even at anthesis, the ovules 1 per locule, attached laterally at or near the base, erect, anatropous; the style usually short and equaling the stamens, somewhat dilated, shortly 2-lobed or bifid apically, the anterior lobe or branch stigmatiferous and subpulvinate-papillose, the posterior lobe or branch smooth and horny and non-stigmatiferous, not as broad as the anterior. Fruit mostly enclosed by the mature calyx, schizocarpous, the pericarp hard and dry, readily separating at maturity into 4, 1-seeded linear or linear-oblong (rarely elliptic-winged) crustaceous nut-lets; seeds 4, erect, oblong, triangular in cross-section, without or with negligible endosperm, the outer face convex, the cotyledons 2, thick, applicate.

Can be grown by cuttings or seedlings. Seeds needs stratification.