Distribution: Occurring on both sides of the Cascades crest in Washington; British Columbia to California, east to Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and Utah; also in eastern North America.

Habitat: Occurring in disturbed soil, waste ground.

Flowers: May-July

Origin: Introduced from Europe

Growth Duration: Perennial

Conservation Status: Not of concern

Pollination: Ants, bees, flies, butterflies, beetles, wasps

Perennial herb from a rhizome, the numerous stems weak, reclining to erect from a decumbent base, 3-12 dm. tall, usually glabrous; short, ascending, leafy, perennial shoots produced from the base in summer and fall.

Leaves in whorls of 6 or 8, sessile, with forward-pointing, scabrous hairs on the margins, otherwise glabrous, broadly linear to linear-oblong, 1-3 cm. long, 1-nerved, tipped with a sharp point.

Flowers numerous in a terminal, branched, spreading panicle; calyx obsolete; corolla 4-lobed, white, 2-4 mm. wide; ovary 2-celled, inferior.

Fruit dry, small, 1-1.5 mm. high, glabrous.