NEN Gallery

This is an upright plant with lance shaped leaves with shallow rounded teeth. The blue flowers have a petal tube with a short upper lip and a longer spreading lower lip with white and purple markings. The single sepal tube has a distinctive scale or bump at the top and contains 4 warty nutlets. The plant grows in wet meadows and fens throughout Britain. It produces a volatile oil used in medicines that is one of the best remedies known for nervous disorders, spasms or epilepsy but this needs expert care as the drug is very powerful and needs to be taken in small quantities only, usually in tablet form. Picture taken at Felmersham, Bedfordshire June 24th 2006.