Plant Name

Scientific Name: Verbascum thapsus

Common Names: Common Mullein, Big Taper, Flannel Plant, Flannel Mullein, Velvet Dock, Velvet Plant, Woolly Mullein, Great Mullein

Plant Characteristics

Duration: Biennial

Growth Habit: Herb/Forb

Arizona Native Status: Introduced. This naturalized weed is native to Europe and the temperate and mountainous parts of Asia.

Habitat: Upland, Mountain. Common Mullein grows in disturbed areas and is especially common along roadsides.

Flower Color: Yellow

Flowering Season: Summer, Fall

Height: Up to 6 feet (1.8 m) tall

Description: The up to 1 inch (2.5 cm) wide flowers are densely packed on tall, upright, stout flower stalks and have 5 oval-shaped, yellow lobes and 5 stamens with orange anthers and white-bearded or yellow-bearded anther filaments. The flowers are followed by ovoid seed capsules. The leaves decrease in size up the stem and are pale grayish green, wavy, covered in soft, dense, velvety hairs, in a basal rosette below, alternate on the flowering stem, and oblanceolate-oblong in shape. The plants are only a basal rosette of leaves for their first year and then bloom during their second year. The plants sometimes have deformed flower stalks that become weirdly cockscomb-shaped or clumped as they develop.

Classification

Kingdom: Plantae – Plants
Subkingdom: Tracheobionta – Vascular plants
Superdivision: Spermatophyta – Seed plants
Division: Magnoliophyta – Flowering plants
Class: Magnoliopsida – Dicotyledons
Subclass: Asteridae
Order: Scrophulariales
Family: Scrophulariaceae – Figwort family
Genus: Verbascum L. – mullein
Species: Verbascum thapsus L. – common mullein

More About This Plant

Arizona County Distribution Map
Common Mullein (Verbascum thapsus) – The Firefly Forest