Scientific name: Verbascum thapsus L.
Common name: Great Mullein
Description
Habit: Biennial, to 1.2 m high, covered with whitish woolly hairs.
Stems: Erect, stout, unbranched.
Leaves: Alternate, without stipules, to 30 cm long, tapered at the base or short-stalked, undivided, oval-oblong, untoothed or crenate.
Flowers: Yellow, zygomorphic, hermaphrodite, 2-2.5 cm across, in groups in the axils of bracts on a long and dense terminal spike; calyx of 5 sepals fused, deeply 5-lobed with a short calyx tube; corolla of 5 fused petals, 5-lobed, lobed spreading and more or less equal; stamens 5, borne on corolla tube; ovary superior, 2-celled, style 1.
Fruits: A capsule.
Habitat: Roadsides, gravel-pits, other dry and open habitats.Distribution: Locally frequent in the E. and S.E. Burren, rare elsewhere.
Native status: Native
Of conservation interest: No